This is the website of Abulsme Noibatno Itramne (also known as Sam Minter). Posts here are rare these days. For current stuff, follow me on Mastodon

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November 2004
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Darkflash: Big Easy

Just a few more of these to go. Things that would have been blog posts had I had a blog at the time they happened. This one was sent to friends and family September 6, 2004 02:31:27 UTC.

So, we left Apalachicola and then within the hour on the radio we heard that the forecasts had changed, and they now definitely thought Frances would be a hurricane again when it hit the panhandle after strengthening in the gulf. And the predicted landfall location was… Apalachicola. Right on the nose. And the panhandle coast, including Apalachicola was announcing evacuations for coastal areas. Including where our motel was. Well, that was that. We’d apparently made the right decision.

Anyway, we main roads were not bad at all along our route, so we did the “fastest” route instead of a back road way. And we indeed made it all the way to New Orleans. We are now in a Motel 6 in New Orleans. (Brandy remembered that ALL Motel 6’s are “pet friendly” so we didn’t even have to search or ask.)

So, we’re in New Orleans. Which is out of the “cone” of possible movement for the center of Frances. Well away from the cone. We probably could have stopped earlier, but we felt like continuing. And neither of us had ever been to New Orleans. Don’t know how much sightseeing we’ll be able to do anyway. We’ll probably mostly be at the motel. But we shall see.

The local New Orleans news is saying that we shouldn’t even get any rain from Frances unless it shifts way further west than expected. So looks like we won’t see any of the fun weather. :-)

Currently we have booked two nights here. That should be enough for Frances to get out of the way. Then depending on what the news is saying about if people should return home we’ll either head home or stay here a little while longer.

And then as soon as we get there, we’ll probably have to leave again for Hurricane Ivan, which seems to be heading right at Florida too. Although perhaps Ivan will go visit Ivan in Miami instead of going to Melbourne like Frances. :-) [Although Ivan is far enough away still that it could pretty much go anywhere from Mexico to the Carolinas.]

Anyway, fun fun fun. The news shows a lot of damage in Melbourne / Palm Bay, but keeps saying it is much less there than a little further south, and it could have been much worse, and most of the damage is not catastrophic. Which is good. But we won’t really have any idea how things are until we get back, or we contact folks we know there who stayed to have them look at the house. We’ll see.

In the mean time, time to go eat, then I think Amy wants to use the pool here. This time we stopped and got suits for all of us. Then to bed. It has been another long day.

Ibengdo Athar Orwamro

My good friend Rebecca just announced to the world what the name of her and Chris’s baby would be. You can see the full post here. This is after Rebecca and Chris went through a lengthy process for deciding on a name. No, it isn’t Ibengdo, although that is what it would be in the same way that my name (Samuel) turns into Abulsme. Perhaps I will call him Ibengdo. But that is not it. See her post for the real name.

I’ll be honest, my first reaction was much the same as the one Rebecca got at her shower. Yes, I think the only thing that will save the youngster from getting beaten at school over his name is the fact that he will be six feet tall by the time he is seven years old. :-)

However, as I started to think about it, I remembered the many emails Rebecca had sent me talking about how “proper” children should behave. You know… Being quiet and well mannered at restaurants. Not running around and making noise at grocery stores. Not having to be told more than once to do something. Not talking back to their parents. You know, that sort of thing. And then, when I pictured in my head a kid that behaves that way all the time, yes, yes… I could see that name. It fits perfectly! :-)

In any case, I am looking forward to meeting the young man in a few months. Congrats Reb and Chris on the name choice. Sorry I couldn’t make either of the two baby showers. I sent something along, you should have it in a few days. Hope Ibengdo likes it!

Frump Watch

A few weeks ago Bob Frump, one of the many bosses I had at my previous employer, emailed with this note:

The History Channel will run a documentary on the sinking of the Marine Electric on Nov. 22, 9 PM EST as a part of its Deepsea Detectives series. The producers seemed to know what they were doing and I have high hopes for it.

I had been waiting to blog this until right before the broadcast. Because I waited, I can augment the above with this additional detail Jon sent me a few days ago:

When the History Channel airs its TV documentary “Ship of Doom” on November 22, […] employees at the corporate campus in Princeton, New Jersey, will see a familiar face.

That’s because the show is based on a book written by their colleague, Bob Frump, the editor in chief for GPC Marketing Brand Communications, and he is interviewed by the TV network’s historians during the show.

Frump’s book, Until the Sea Shall Free Them, is the nonfiction narrative of how an old ship, the S.S. Marine Electric, sank with most of her crew off the Virginia coast during a winter storm in 1983. Frump said Disney/Buena Vista has optioned film rights for the book, which was published in 2002, and has budgeted production for a feature film.

The History Channel airs the show on Monday, November 22, at 9 pm Eastern time as part of its Deepsea Detectives series, whose episodes feature the attempts by divers and technical experts to discover the reasons behind famous shipwrecks over the centuries.

For the “Ship of Doom” episode, divers searched the rusted hulk of the Marine Electric 134 feet beneath the Atlantic to discover what caused the merchant ship to sink. The History Channel’s website synopsizes the theme this way: “Survivors blamed the owners for sending an unsafe boat to sea. But the owners charged that one of the survivors caused his crewmates’ deaths by failing to observe basic safety procedures. In the shadow of these allegations, the wreck is a potential crime scene.”

That is from an announcement sent out to employees back there at the old job.

In any case, congratulaions to Bob, this is great! Now everybody go set your Tivos!

Uh, and Brandy, I forgot to set our Tivo to get this. Can you set it so I won’t forget later? Thanks! :-)