Thursday, May 24, 2007

Bow to the Queen!

After all, Stephanie means "crowned one". However, that's not why you should bow. You should bow because I am going to be playing the part of Titania, Queen of the Fairies -insert fag hag joke here- in the summer production of Midsummer Night's Dream down in High Springs.

I'm so psyched! There aren't actually that many lines, but it's one of the most recognizable characters from the play. If any of you are in the area at the end of July, beginning of August you should come check it out!

Friday, May 11, 2007

Panic! At the Homestead

This morning - 1:30 in the morning to be exact - I was awakened by my sister saying that we got a phone call to be evacuated. It was a recorded phone call, and it gave no time by which we should evacuate, only a phone # for more info, which was of course, busy.

Well Kellie made the mistake of telling my mother before we formulated a plan or figured out what the hell was going on, and as my mother always does in these situations, she panicked. She started rushing around, grabbing and packing everything she could. Kellie tried calling some of her friends who lived out here as well, and none of them had gotten phone calls.

Then my aunt Susan called. Apparently my mother had gotten a hold of the phone and called her. (Why - I have no idea - she lives in VA). Kellie and I were trying to reason, saying we at least had until morning if we did have to leave, and she kept going "No, I-10 is closing down". Right - when do we use I-10? Almost never. And that's north of us and they're evacuating everyone north of I-10.

She persisted however, and had us gathering things she could sell if we needed money when our house burned down. Kellie finally made her call Gloria, my mother's pastor (for lack of a better word), and her husband was the voice of reason. They live out this way too, and he said they hadn't gotten any phone calls either. He promised that he would help us get out if we needed to evacuate. That satisfied her (this is about an hour later), and we were able to go back to bed. Frank called back shortly saying that he talked to an emergency worker, and apparently they made the automated phone area too large, and they were having to call people back to tell them to stay home. I'm glad we waited and were cautious (well, Kellie and I were). If my mother would've had her way, we would have been out of the house by 2:30 this morning just driving around, or headed to her friend's house in Gainesvile.

I slept until 10, when my mother woke me - again, to tell me she was going to stay with her friend Dawn out in McAlpin or O'Brien. I stayed behind, and they left directions to her house. I think they're doing it to give her comfort and placate her, but depending upon how bad the smoke gets, I may go too.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

How Can We Sleep When Our Beds Are Burning?

Lake City has had some pretty frightening conditions over the past few days. There have been some wildfires to the north of us (some started by that wicked lightning storm we had last Saturday).

This past Monday, at about 2 in the afternoon, the whole atmosphere was a deep yellow, and ash rained down. I thought today was going to be like that too, but it got much worse. Yellow turned to amber, which turned to orange, and then to red. Very eerie. Here are some pics:











Those orbs are the ash reflecting the flash in the camera. Those pics were taken at about 3:45 today. I tried to get a shot with my watch in the field, but it was so dark, and the flash to bright, you couldn't see the time anyways.