hey all you GP folk in the great state of Texas...the weather looks like it getting ready to break nasty down your way...time to get all those GP's to high ground!...I'd hate to see any of you lose your ride to storm or flooding...hope all of you come thru this ok.

My roommate's family lives about an hour away from Galveston; she's really sweating it right now. All this hurricane business is really relentless.

I browsed by The Weather Channel earlier today, and it looks like that stuff will be reaching all the way up here in Denton. Enough so that my friend here is reconsidering traveling to Irving this weekend. And unfortunately .. my GP was taken back down to Waco. *cries* It's closer to it than I am!

I got all the loose stuff out of the back yard and into the garage. Secured everything else together with rope and bungees. The wife's dad & step mom are in from Galveston, I think he thinks I'm a nut because I cleaned up the yard in preparation for the storm. He thinks they got away from it, It's projected to hit Austin with 50-70mph winds. They're really not planning on going home to see a lot of anything.
The GTP will be in the garage, nice and safe, while the wifes Avalon will be forced to deal with the elements.
If I get any damage I'll post some pics, if I have electricity.

Austin,

I heard tonight on CNN that it could hit Austin with hurricane force winds (I thought that was stronger than the 70-90 you listed, but maybe not). Anyways, take care man.

They said Rita is now the third stronged hurricane in recorded history. It's really grown in the past day or two. It's going to be a whopper.

Watching local news right now, they're saying when it reaches Austin it'll be down to a cat 1 hurricane. News says wind gust should be anywhere between 35-75mph.
I've got batteries, and a 150 watt power inverter I can plug into my car, it'll be good enough to power a TV and DVD player if/when we lose power.. The wife wants to buy something so I told her to go buy water tomorrow.

no matter what happens, good luck to all of you in TX. the wife's aunt, uncle, and cousins live in houston and are heading here for a while... except for her uncle and one cousin... they're being forced to stay due to job. they got sent home from LA for three days to pick thinks/secure things and get family to high ground, but they got told they can't leave the town of houston. (they work for power company) that sucks big time

my hats off to those guys from the power companies...they get out and brave almost as much crap as the fire dept does...I dont envy them at all.

It looks like it may be bad for us in Gonzales they anounced evacuation for Cuero TX about 30 min. south of here ,we are trying to get ready for the big one but I have little experience with hurricanes.Chico.

Looks like it's tracking more to the east. Austin's out of the cone, but not out of it completely. IF Rita slows down once it makes land fall, it could dump a butt load of rain on us.

Heard on the news this morning, traffic coming into Austin is horrible. Someone got on the road last night at 7:30. At 7:00 this morning she hadn't made it to Austin yet.
Also heard at 9:am this morning the Gov is making certain highways heading out of Houston, 1-way... out.

Chico, clean up your yard and secure everything else. Tie it down to something, and stock up on batteries for lights, radio's, etc.
It's gunna get windy!

Here in Florida we have had our share of "whoppers". These things are nothing to play around with so you guys just make sure that you are prepared. This one is gonna be a big one.

Good Luck to all of you, and of course the GP's.

On a serious note, a dear friend of mine has just moved down to Katy, TX (near Houston)in the last 2 weeks. I was worried about her and her sister's family. She finally talked to her sister and family to go to Dallas and stay with her nephew. Her brother-in-law is the only one staying behind because he's on the HPD.

UPDATE: Just got off the phone with her and it appears that they have no other choice to stay. All the roads leading out are are jam packed and travels only 1 mile per 6 hours!!!

Good luck to all in Texas! My thoughts and prayers are with you all!!!

Let's watch gas prices skyrocket! Like last time, but worse! God I'm dreading it. Good luck everyone in TX.

My parents are in the think of it -- BEAUMONT -- I told them to head to Amerillo or if they can stand the drive, come on up to colorado......

Arc, this storm hitting Waco? I don't know my Texas geography. I have a friend in grad school down there.

Andrew,
Waco is between Austin and the DFW area, about halfway, on I-35.
At this point it looks like Austin-Waco is safe. the storm is projected to head up east Texas, where it will meet up with our first cold front of the season. The cold front will basically push the "low" back down through central Texas. That will gives us a butt load of rain early-mid next week. We're no onger expecting high winds, maybe 20-25mph, which we've had before, so no big deal for us on this issue.

BTW... Austin is just now starting to see the higher clouds from Rita and she's still about 250-300 miles out from Galveston.