Yeah, so I missed two more days, but you can blame it on Hurricane/Tropical Storm/Tropical Depression Isabel taking out power at home (and likely it is still out as I type this - I am at Anthony's house currently).

So, that made for an interesting couple of days, to say the least.

Day one - woke up just after my brother had finished the outdoor preparations - he removed the unused DirecDuo dish, put the outdoor grill in the garage, extended all the water pipes, etc. So, what did I do to prepare for the hurricane? Of course, I finished off another episode of Pretear. ^^;

Power went out at about 7:16pm. Just before that on IRC, people who had lost power were calling people on cell phones who still had power, and I was joking that I had no one left to call =P So, when my power went out, I looked through my stored numbers, and ended up calling Laura (Maizie) ^^; We then had a nice 3 and a half minute conversation about weather. ^^;;;

Not much happened while power was out. We had a leak near one of the basement windows that required some creative bucket placement to cover. I spent the night with my GBA SP (which had enough power to last me even though I haven't charged the thing in months) - a good hour and a half was spent with Megaman Zero, then I switched to Metroid Fusion, opting to start a new game. Yep, Metroid was a whole lot more fun.

Day two - still no power. Bro pulls out an old tabletop version of Wheel of Fortune. We play that for some 5 rounds before putting it away, then going out to eat. (For the last two rounds, I was text messaging Jessica, who I apparently was keeping awake by keeping a conversation over text... oops x_x) Driving after a hurricane passes through is interesting - there were many, many places where tree limbs were interfering with overhead lines, and downed trees in people's yards. Shady Grove Rd. was closed between Crabbs Branch and 355, too, though I saw them let a USPS truck through to get back to the depot.

After stopping at a Greek/Italian restaurant that ended up not having power, we ended up having lunch at Mama Wok - my bro picked our table based on it having a power outlet on the wall so he could recharge his cell ^^; After eating, we stopped at Giant for water and other supplies, then headed back home.

Not having anything else to do, I ended up mowing the lawn, of all things to do. I actually ran over a piece of our roof that somehow ended up in the middle of our backyard. There was another piece even further out, but I stopped to pick that one up rather than running it over.

After mowing the lawn, I set out to Anthony's, as I now needed a shower, and our house doesn't have any supply of water when there's no power for the well pump to run off of. Packing up the PS2, I realized that pop'n 8 was still in it, and I needed power to eject it if I was to transport it a long distance. So, I actually brought the PS2 into Giant and plugged it in there (though only the 4th employee that happened to overhear what I was asking actually knew where there was a plug I could use - apparently, this Giant was running off its own generators).

So, I set off to Anthony's...

... and a somewhat empty large jug flies into my lane. Not being able to change lanes, I fly right into it.

Yep, went to the shoulder, and found it wedged between the front and the wheelwell, and had to yank it out. I love when people decide they can discard large plastic jugs right onto the interstate.

It was a few minutes after that I realized that I had forgotten to bring Anthony's Hysteric Blue single that I had been borrowing since Otakon. Yep, the "I ALWAYS forget something when leaving the house" rule continues.

Got to Anthony's house in pretty good time (unlike the local roads, the interstates were actually in good shape, and you couldn't even tell it was rush hour), took that shower I so badly needed, and we went to Valley Mall in Hagerstown to buy FFTA and eat.

FFTA is interesting. I bet it would make more sense to me if I had actually played FFT.

Anthony's internet came back while we were messing with FFTA, so he did stuff there for a while, until we decided to pop in SC2 X-Box - with only one controller. Drat, I knew I should have brought that controller converter =P So, we ended up playing Weapon Master mode, getting to the last chapter, but stopping because we needed sleep and we didn't want to do the last dungeon.

So, yeah, now I'm typing this entry in the guest room, and I should sleep if I'm going to get up at the same time as Anthony tomorrow morning. Playland tourney, 2nd try starts in 11 hours...