This blog will be back. Really.

Okay, I've said it before many times, but I'm going to make it a New Year resolution to have at least 50 blog posts in 2012. If you knkow me well, you know that I have a knack for telling stories of all sorts. My love for storytelling drove me to create this blog in the first place, but I've never been completely happy at the results. Part of my unhappiness with my blog comes from the fact that my storytelling style doesn't really make much sense when directly transcribed. I use a lot of gestures and flavor words when I talk. Therefore, it is sometimes a bit of a challenge to create a written product that it equal in meaning to my verbal story, but I think I'm getting better at it.

I'm also getting ready to launch my long-awaited second blog, which may or may not actually have my name attached to it due to the nature of the content.

Anyway, I'm off to hit to bed shortly after ringing in the new year. Thanks for reading!

Trial By Fire

I head off this morning to help out with the Lateral West Fire. The fire has been burning on Great Dismal Swamp NWR since August 4. Hurricane Irene dumped a lot of rain on it, but the fire remains active. It is about 90% contained.

I will be at the fire from today until the 23rd. I'm supposed to be supporting logistics, but they've been very vague about what I'll actually be doing. They literally told me to show up at 9 am today with a pickup and maybe a laptop. This will be interesting at the very least.

Thanks for reading.

The Day After

Quick update: somehow still have power. Skies are mostly cloudy and there are still some occasional moderate winds, but for the most part, it's relatively calm. There are branches and leaves everywhere.

No word yet on status of my house or the conditions (road/flooding) in Virginia Beach, so I'll stay put until I hear anything.

Hurricane update

Conditions have improved significantly for my immediate area in Chesapeake. Winds have died down to a fraction of what they were earlier this evening, although we got some pretty strong gusts around 10-11 pm that scared me a bit.

As of a few minutes ago, it was estimated that 371,000 customers in the Hampton Roads have lost power. What's surprising is that 379,000 customers have lost power in the Richmond area, which probably was hurt more by the winds. We benefited from a number of lulls in the storm (there was a significant die-down in the winds in the later part of afternoon), but it seemed like Richmond really got pounded, as well as a strip from Isle of Wight county southwest to Franklin.

I intend to return to the house either tomorrow afternoon/evening or Monday. My supervisor, who is staying down the road at our office, has informed us that she will check on it (and other refuge facilities) to see if it is safe to return. I'm not sure what to expect; I haven't seen anything in the news from most of VB except areas right along the ocean. Sandbridge seems to have been hit really hard and even had a tornado. It was strange to see places I drive pass every day show up on TV.

Well, it's bedtime for me. I'll update tomorrow and throughout the week to show the damage that Irene has caused.

Hurricane Update

I'm still here in Chesapeake. Somehow, we still have power, but it's pretty windy and the lights have been flickering on and off. I still don't have my camera because, quite honestly, I afraid to go outside for fear of getting struck in the head by one of the many branches flying around. The lawn and the streets are absolutely covered in leaves and branches. Since this afternoon, a group of robins has taken shelter under my car.

About an hour ago, we got reports that the eye of the storm was passing just to the east of Knotts Island, home of Mackay Island NWR and whose staff I have worked with on a few occasions. The eye then passed just to the east of Virginia Beach and is currently moving north in a direction parallel to the Eastern Shore of Virginia.

Meanwhile, I have been reading a book on wombats and enjoying a marathon of Warehouse 13. At this point, I've become significantly less nervous and am much more optimistic about the situation, though I remain very cautious. I'm anticipating significant damage to my house and am anticipating a very harrowing drive home tomorrow or Monday.

That's all for now; I will keep you updated as the storm progresses.

Hurricane update

I arrived at my friend's house in Chesapeake about midnight. It was already raining a bit when I started driving, but the rain didn't get really bad until about mid-morning today.

According to the news, winds are gusting about 40-50 mph. There are a number of small branches down, but we still have power. The news says we have about 5 inches of rain; I believe it. I left my camera in the car, but I'm afraid to get it from all the debris flying around.

Other updates from people in the area: a tornado has hit Sandbridge with damage to several houses. My supervisor and her family are doing okay in one of our offices, which is now running on a generator. As the office is down the street from my house, I can assume we lost power.

For those of you who live outside the Hampton Roads, you can find out more about the situation here at local news outlets like wtkr.com. National news isn't covering us at all. Thousands throughout the region are without power already, and there's been one death from a falling tree. The eye is expected to pass almost directly over us at about 8 this evening.

I will keep everyone updated. The worst of Hurricane Irene is yet to come.

Hurricane update

We evacuated the office today; we closed at 12 (but closed to the public yesterday). We put shutters over the windows and doors of the visitor contact station and have distributed vehicles to those employees who live in areas that are less prone to flooding. I also went through our maintenance compound (which is a mess to begin with) and made sure there was nothing that could either float away or cause damage being blown around. For example, I put a number of relatively thin metal items in garages and other buildings. I also tied our portable toilets to the building.

I'm currently taking a break in the midst of hurricane-proofing my house. I'm pretty sure I'm going to lose power, so I (unfortunately) have to throw away EVERYTHING IN MY REFRIGERATOR. Luckily, there's nothing I'm too upset to toss, but it's still rather depressing.
If you think what I'm doing is a little overboard, you should know that I have lost power four times this summer (more than anyone else I know), all of those during relatively routine summer thunderstorms. I'm generally one of the first houses to lose power and the last to get it back.

In anticipation of flooding, I have moved my bike from the shed to my apartment. There's really nothing else of importance (the first floor is vacant) except the lawnmower, but there's nothing I can do about that.

In anticipation of high winds, I have moved my outdoor trash bins to the shed, which of course will only work if the shed doesn't blow/float away. At work, there were several buoys lying around, so I secured some them with rope (because I'm going to be the guy who has to get buoys out of a tree after the storm).

I plan to leave the house for at least the first day/night of the storm, but I'm also preparing for my eventual return. Again, I anticipate not having power for a while, so I'm filling up the bathtubs and any container I can find with water to flush the toilet/shower with when I return. I've got several 5-gallon containers of water either here on in my car, and I have plenty of nonperishables to last me a few days.

Well, it's back to packing. I'll continue to update as much as I can.

Thanks for reading.

Hurricane Irene

At times, this blog as served as a host for rants about the environment, poltical commentary, movie criticism, and descriptions of what I consider my mundanely unique life. Today, it takes on a new role.
Hurricane Irene is quickly making its way towards the Hampton Roads area. As of the latest projection, it looks like it is going to make landfall somewhere in North Carolina and is pretty much going to pass directly over the area. NOAA has published the following map...

...which looks really scary even if you don't know what it means, mainly because everything is bright red.

I plan to use this website to keep people updated on how the storm is progressing through the area. I, for one, will NOT be staying at home during the storm; the chance of flooding is way too high for my liking. I don't mind the wind so much as I hate the idea of being stuck in a house surrounded by rising floodwaters. I will most likely be staying at the home of a coworker in a higher area of town.

Well, I've got to head to work now; I spent much of yesterday perparing the office and our maintenance compound. The office I'm in has shutters on all the windows and doors except one, and we're distributing vehicles to people who live in higher-ground areas. I will keep you all updated on the situation.

Thanks for reading.

Live from Madison...

I am now blogging on official government time. I am using one of several computers specifically set up for conference users to access social media. This is just one of many ways that the National Wildlife Refuge System is continuing to show that it can step outside of the box and access a wider audience.

The past two days have been an absolute whirlwind of intelligent conversation and networking. Yesterday was focused more on revising the 24 recommendations in the Conserving the Future vision document, while today and yesterday are more focused on implementing those recommendations. Some of the recommendations I have been involved in discussing include:

• Urban Wildlife Refuges - Promoting refuges in urban areas as a means to reach out to more constituents. I was sure to emphasize the role of partners, including private land trusts and local governments, in building conservation properties.
• Land Acquisition - I have been involved in several productive conversations regarding expansion of existing refuges and creation of new ones. Once again, cooperation with partner organizations was a major theme, especially in this day and age of tight budgets.
• Inventory and monitoring - I always end up with the complicated topic, which in this case involved reconciling the dozens of ways that data is stored and managed at the 553 refuges throughout the country. I didn't really understand what was going on (way too many acronyms were thrown around), but I think that we're moving in a direction or standardizing the data that is collected at refuges around the country.
• Adaptive management - Adaptive management is a philosophy that consists of managing land with consistent attention to measurable metrics. I had a great discussion about the struggles of land managers throughout the country, but we identified several challenges that all of us face.

I feel like I'm cutting this short, but I have to take off for a reception. Thanks for reading!

Reboot!

It's official - I'm restarting this blog. I've actually been intending to restart it since I came back from a trip to Germany two months ago (I promise, pictures WILL go up). However, I've got an even better reason to restart - I will be attending Conserving the Future: Wildlife Refuges and the Next Generation, a gathering of over 1200 people in Madison, Wisconsin.

The purpose of Conserving the Future is to facilitate discussion on the further development of America's National Wildlife Refuges. As someone who has worked on and visited wildlife refuges extensively, I am extremely excited to be a part of a larger effort to examine the challenges and prospects that the refuge system faces.

At the core of the conference is a vision document that is a proposed set of goals and objectives for the 553-member refuge system. In addition to facilitated discussions surrounding various facets of the document, the conference will also include talks from leaders in conservation and workshops and discussions on various issues related to refuges (including one led by one of my colleagues).

I'm extremely excited for what I expect to be an extremely fulfilling week. I plan to be giving updates to my readers on people I meet, discussions I take part in, and things I see. I hear Madison's a cool city, so expect lots of pictures (to be followed by the Germany photos).

To follow the conference yourself, go to http://americaswildlife.org/conference/.

Thanks for reading!

Oscar Time!

My annual tradition of judging movies I've never seen has moved into the digital age. I've seen a whopping 5 of the 25 nominated acting performances (compared to a couple years ago, when I saw two). That said, I've been right for Best Picture every single year since about 2003 except for last year, even though I’ve probably seen less than a quarter of the nominees. I mostly make my predictions based on Hollywood politics, which seems to often play a bigger role than actual artistic ability.
For simplicity, I've listed just my predictions and omitted the other nominees. I've thrown in some commentary as well.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Toy Story 3. Yup, you read that right.
Best Original Screenplay: The King’s Speech
Best Supporting Actor: Christian Bale, The Fighter.
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo, The Fighter. She’s one of the most underrated actresses in Hollywood, but I think this may be her shot.
Best Actress: Natalie Portman, Black Swan. Not only did I actually see this movie, but I had nightmares of Natalie Portman chasing me around in a theater with a letter opener.
Best Actor: I’m going to call the upset: James Franco, 127 Hours. I know it doesn’t make any sense given all the buzz about Colin Firth’s performance in The King’s Speech, but Franco has spent most of his career cast in horribly sappy romance movies when I knew all along he could be doing something better. I almost called Jeff Bridges on this because he’s awesome.
Best Director: Tom Hooper, The King’s Speech.
Best Picture: The King’s Speech. I almost gave this one to The Social Network or Black Swan (even though I hate the former) simply because I didn’t know how likely the Academy was to give this award to a biographical film (they gave it to The Last Emperor, A Beautiful Mind, and Gandhi but snubbed Milk, Capote, and The Aviator, among others). That said, I really can’t argue with the fact that all the signs are pointing to Hooper and The King’s Speech.

Overall Comments: I’d love to see an upset from The Kids Are All Right. Inception is probably the coolest movie I’ve seen in a while. Toy Story 3 almost made me cry, which is hard to do. However, I know that the Academy really doesn’t stick its neck out too much (after all, they were lambasted for giving Chicago and Crash Best Picture awards), so there’s only so much that I can hope for from a movie about a lesbian couple, an action movie, and a cartoon. That said, there’s no doubt The King’s Speech is still a well-crafted and well-acted film, and it’s bound to be rewarded.

Thanks for reading.