Six days after Ike, Houston is still pretty torn up. It’s strange to go about my normal business, more or less, and be surrounded by wreckage.

Tonight I came home after curfew (is that still on?) and man, it was dark out there. It’s like being out in the country, except you’re passing strip centers instead of cow pastures, and the tall buildings block out the stars.

I thought the curfew was just to cut down on looting, but it can be tough driving after dark. With many of the streetlights and traffic lights still out, trying to get through an unfamiliar area is dicey. The traffic-lights-turned-stop-signs aren’t flashing red*, they’re dark. On an unlit street. Sometimes they’re lying on the sidewalk.

There’s also a funny phenomenon, now that everyone’s gotten used to pausing at every light, where people treat working lights as stop signs, too. Several times now I’ve seen people stop at green lights and nearly run red ones. I’ve stopped at a green myself, and earlier tonight I almost honked at a line of cars stopped at a red, like hey people, it’s totally your turn.

The distribution of electricity seems completely random, though I’m sure there’s a method to the madness. My apartment complex got power back midday Sunday, which makes us VERY LUCKY. Five days later, the people across the street? No power. The townhomes next door? No power. The traffic light and convenience store catacorner? Got power back Tuesday, IIRC. The houses behind us? No power. We are a beacon of adequate refrigeration in an otherwise candle-lit neighborhood.

The fancy condo a few streets down is also still powerless. Bet those swanky penthouses are a lot less fun when you have to walk up thirty flights of stairs in the dark to get to them. The little red airplane lights on the roof are still on, though, so maybe they can use that generator to light the stairwells.

Six days after Ike, there’s still something ridiculous like a million people without power. And I don’t mean “million” in the sense of “a whole bunch, like a gazillion,” I mean literally one million people. No power. Six days. At least the weather’s been mild…eh? Okay, sorry, I know your life still totally sucks right now.

Galveston is flat-out closed. Just closed. There’s not enough island to go back to, I guess. If I’d been watching local TV I’d probably know how many people died there, but I’ve only kept up with national online news (which has mostly forgotten about Ike**) and public radio every now and then. I did read somewhere that 40% of Galvestonians(?) stayed to ride out the storm, which I find amazing. But then maybe it takes a little devil-may-care to live on a barrier island in the first place. Anyway, it’s a tragedy.

I really thought we’d be back on our feet after a week, but it’s going to take a lot longer than that. I just thank my lucky stars that my friends and family and I are all safe.

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*Today I saw one flashing red and green simultaneously. Four-way stop? Four-way go? Who knows!

** Big picture, I’m going to count this as a blessing. It means we don’t have a Superdome.

Tags: Houston, Hurricane Ike

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