My wife and I went to visit her sister and family in Sarasota - I got to witness my first Hurricane (and participate in 2 days of cleanup).

We were in the Sarasota area, about 10 miles east of Siesta Key.  On Wednesday we prepared by putting a lot of things away, moving the rabbits and chickens indoors, installing reinforcing cables inside the large screen pool cover, taking down some portable fences that go around the chicken and rabbit areas (to keep the Bobcats away).

We got some pretty significant wind on Thursday afternoon, and it rained on/off for most of the evening and night - but the rain stopped early in the morning.  We lost power early on as the storm approached, and a few times while the storm was in progress.....the internet was out for days.  We had a lot of limbs and sticks to pick up - but that was the extent of the damage.  Cleaning up the yard took a couple of long mornings - we stopped in the afternoon when it got really hot and humid.  There was really nothing that would qualify as "damage" - just debris.

The area along the coast was devastated!  My wife's sister has family that lives at Siesta Key - and all of their houses were damaged significantly.  The storm surge came up and got into the first floor of just about every house and business in Siesta Key.....and anywhere up the gulf coast.  The amount of damage is incredible!

And it is not limited to Florida.  The areas up in the Smokies and Blue Ridge Mountains in Tennessee and North Carolina had a huge amount of flooding that has damaged entire towns and washed out roads and bridges.  The damage done by this storm in incredible!

It will take a very long time for the damage from this storm to be repaired, and I expect a lot of the small mom and pop businesses may never recover.