Still no rain, but the wind has kicked up to a respectable level. I managed to get Sam to go poop already (he HATES rain and won’t go out in it)—a major victory.

Absolutely everything is closed now, so people are just wandering around outside to watch the bands of clouds roll by and chat with their neighbors. It’s disappointing that Ike will come ashore in the middle of the night, so that we won’t see the most exciting parts of it. If the eye is predicted to track over us, though, we’re setting an alarm. Seriously.

We took a walk along Buffalo Bayou earlier in the afternoon. It appeared to be up a foot or so already—probably the biggest sign we’ve seen on the ground yet that there’s anything more than a front coming through.

…and the power just blinked off twice. Ooooh, this doesn’t look good. I was hoping it would at least last until bedtime. Don’t be surprised if you don’t hear from me for a while, though.

Many non-essential businesses have closed, including our favorite tapioca tea place, which had shut down three hours before we got there last night. Argh. I mean, I knew the storm would be rough, but I didn’t think I’d have to get through it without those tasty tapioca balls.

Gas stations, too, are closing as they run out of gas, much as they did before Rita. I’d have thought, with more people staying put this time around, that the majority of the stations might still be open right up until the storm hit, but maybe they all operate so just-in-time-ly that *any* run on gas is enough to crash the system. I’m drawing my conclusions from an admittedly small sample size of the three gas stations I’ve observed, but surely that’s representative enough.

The weather here is still lovely—sun, blue skies, 82 degrees. If it weren’t for those scary satellite photos, we’d all be planning picnics this weekend.

I really hope the eye comes right over us. That’s not the best thing to wish for, I guess, but come on, how neat would that be? I’ve never been in the eye of a hurricane before. Supposedly it’s pretty amazing, right up until the eye wall smashes your roof in.

There’s not much left to do around here except sit and wait, so that’s what we’re doing. We’ll probably take a good walk later in the morning. Maybe I’ll go to the grocery store and take pictures of the empty shelves again—for some reason that fascinates me.

I woke up this morning to a radio broadcast of a press conference by Mayor White and Judge Emmett about Ike’s progress and the city’s plans. The gist was that yes, it looks like it’s coming straight for us, but everyone without special needs who does not live in one of the few zip codes under mandatory evacuation should shelter in place, dear God, SHELTER IN PLACE. By the way, we’ve been telling you for months to get your hurricane supplies ready, so it’s not our fault if you get to the store and there’s no bottled water left.

All indications are that this will be the worst direct hit on Houston since 1983′s Alicia, though it’s likely to cause less damage than piddly little Tropical Storm Allison, which stalled and dumped rain until people started drowning in elevators and parking garages, and keeping your hospital’s generators in the basement suddenly didn’t seem like a good idea any more.

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While cycling to school, John found a brand new “sport psychology” textbook in the middle of the road. There was no hint as to who owned it or how it got into the street, so he brought it home. Before he shipped it off to the person who bought it from him on Amazon (not in College Station—he checked), I flipped it open and found a passage full of marvelously ridiculous acronyms.

Here are a few choice snippets from the thousand-word section titled “Basking in Reflected Glory.” I swear I’m not making this up.

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So I’ve been in law school for a week, and I bet you’re ready to hear all about it, right? Ha!

So far I’ve been a strict compartmentalizer. There is school, which happens in and around the law building from 8:30 to 6:00 four days a week (and 9:30 to noon on Fridays), there is not-school, which happens at other places during other times, and never the twain shall meet. The only not-school things I do during the school day are occasionally check email and answer important calls, and when I go home, I leave all my books in my carrel.

It’s then something of an open question which category blogging about law school falls into. Okay, so maybe it’s pretty obvious that telling the internet *about* school doesn’t help me *do* school one bit, but maybe I’m looking for an excuse not to recount my first week in detail tonight, mkay?

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