Weather Woes

Yeah I know, you are thinking... You live in Hawaii so quite yer bitchin. Since this is my blog I will bitch anyway. We have been having lots of rain and pretty much icky weather for the past 10 days. Lets start with last week Wednesday.....
It starts pouring, so that means my satellite internet wont work, TV dish wont work and radio wont come in. Instead of doing much needed housework, I head down the "road" to hang out at the used bookstore. Get involved in a great debate about the Super Ferry here and about the greenhouses found on the moon (not making that one up...lol). The "gentleman" also started talking about the pyramids on Mars. Ummmkay. I finally notice the totally flooded highway (all two lanes of it) and the lightning going off. The three minute drive to pick C up from school ends up taking about 20 minutes. The kids are inside the cafeteria (dont want them to get hit by lightning). C is escorted to the car and starts naming all the kids who were crying about the thunder. I finally get to B's school (another short drive) about 15 minutes later. The storm is getting more intense. So we head home. The normally 10 minute drive to the turn off takes about 25 minutes. Ugh. Then we head up the "road". The road is one lane, partially paved and bad on a good day. As I head up, the lightning and thunder intensify. The main highway is at about 1800 feet, my house is at about 2800' elevation. Hubby calls while I am trying to see through the rain and can hear the thunder through the phone. As I get closer to home (and the unpaved last mile) it gets spooky. I can imagine a tree getting struck and falling on the car. In the open areas, I imagine the car getting hit. Yes I am a wuss! Once we hit the "driveway" the worst part of the ride home, guess what hubby asks? "Can you cover my tractor when you get home". Yeah, hell no. Once we scramble from the car into the house, all hell breaks loose. I grew up in the Southwest. I have been through many desert storms, in the 18 years I have lived in Hawaii, I have never been through one like this. The scary stuff lasts over an hour and a half. Due to flooded roads, a lot of kids were stuck at the schools til 5-6:00. The buses couldnt get through. Several homes and businesses were damaged in Kealakekua and Napoopoo. I spoke with dh cousin over the weekend. She is 76 and had never experienced a storm like that, and she was really scared by it all. The rest of last week was mostly rain and clouds. Not good when you live on solar power.
Now onto this past Wednesday. High wind warnings and flash flood warnings. Sigh. I kept the girls home on Wed, mainly worried about the high winds closing the only road there is. We sat on the back porch and watched the 100' tall trees sway and creak. The top of an Eucalyptus broke off. A few smaller branches were snapped of some trees too. We got at least 5' of rain (the gauge only holds 5'). Thursday, one look at the driveway and there is no way I am going to drive down to take the girls to school. Hubby stays home and starts scraping the mud off the driveway to make it semi passable. We slid down the hill to get some groceries.
Today was another fun drive down. The mud is two feet deep in places very scary when you are going downhill. I parked the car at the bottom of the drive way (a quarter mile) and slogged uphill. Slippers (aka flipflops on the Mainland) are not meant for this. Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are under blizzard warnings....oooo fun. More high winds may occur and more rain. The price of paradise.......