Irene Update from Midstate PA...

A pretty quiet evening on the whole for this part of the Mid-Atlantic; my guess is we in the midstate are going to get off reasonably lightly.

The past 2-1/2 hours have had light to moderate rains and breezy conditions, but nothing serious.  That could change as the night goes on.

http://www.my9tv.com/subindex/news/live_video

An interesting steady cam on the Jersey Shore somewhere...the sound of the wind, the rain hitting the camera and the ground is different.  There are some voices, but I don't know if they're camera minders or people just out for "fun."

http://www.weather.com/tv/tvshows/Livestream

The Weather Channel has done pretty well on the coverage today and tonight, mostly because the Drama Queens aren't on much, if at all.  The people who do the real work are at it, and it's good work so far.

Now if you've watched any of this, the closer to shore you are the more dangerous this is.  Then, there are some people who have no clue whatsoever:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY4gJoKwtAQ&feature=player_embedded&has_verified=1

What do you want to bet someone's gonna demand that idiot be charged for indecent exposure?  Actually, the whole world now knows he's a moron, so that should be enough shame for him...do have to admit though, it was pretty funny.

Twitterverse for me is pretty quiet, don't have a lot of followers.  Some of the comments and re-tweets are pretty funny.  A literary agent named JC reports her cousin in Vermont is terrified she will die.

Um...as a native Vermonter, the storm's not going up there...she stands a better chance of being butted by an irate deer while jogging than dying from the storm.

I'm so having too much fun...no specific duties until tomorrow morning.  Quiet day at WITF, covering KYW Sports...wall to wall weather coverage of course:  Phillies game postponed, Union match postponed, just about everything shut down and done till the storm passes through. 

I thought tonight might be a good stretch of my skills as a blogger, to keep you in the loop.  Just for fun more than anything; right now, pretty quiet.  Still very light rain, and the wind has again picked up, but nothing too terrible at this point.

The cats are pretty calm about it all; you can generally tell if something's up, based on their behavior.  Baldrick I think was a bit worried early on yesterday, but now everyone's laid back.

Hell, even the deer are back...more pics on my new folder on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/tory.gates

Yeah, having too much fun here...I will see what else there is to do while listening and checking in on things.

If you're in the zone, I wish you safety through this time and to be careful. 

1 million w/o power in the Mid-Atlantic, heavy gusts in Virginia; I'd check with friends down in the VA/DC region earlier...it's getting a bit more hairy now, I'm sure.

Okay...again, be safe!