Blow me

Just when you thought hurricane season was over... along comes Sandy, what some East Coast weather forecasters are calling "The Storm of the Century." (Sometimes I think Schadenfreude is a requirement for being a meteorologist.)

Already, Hurricane Sandy has wreaked havoc upon Jamaica, Cuba, Haiti, and the Bahamas, killing 21. Now it's headed northeast, whirling past Miami and Palm Beach, Florida, toward the Mid-Atlantic region and Southern New England just in time to turn the lights out on Halloween. (That Mother Nature, she sure knows how to deliver a trick!)

Here's a map of Sandy's progress and current projected path. (Right now forecasters are predicting the storm to slam into the Mid-Atlantic region and Southern New England Monday night or Tuesday a.m., bringing high gusts of wind and inches of rain, downing trees and power lines and knocking out power to millions along the Eastern Seaboard. Boo.)

As someone who lost power for six days after the first puff of Irene and again two months later, at precisely this time of year, when we had the Snowpocalypse, and again recently when another storm blew through (albeit only for a couple of days that last time), I do not share the macabre glee of the weather forecasters and networks at the thought of another major storm wreaking havoc upon the Northeast.

However, there is one potential silver lining (albeit a tarnished one) to Sandy: instead of a shitstorm of campaign coverage and ads that make us want to run and hide until after November 6, now we have an actual shitstorm to deal with! Plus, if we don't have power, we can't receive any annoying robo-calls or watch Super PAC ads!

Joking aside, I pray that Sandy loses steam before coming ashore -- or blows out to sea -- sparing the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states. But in the meantime, we'll be filling our bathtubs and water bottles and doing all of our laundry Monday (as we have well water and are the only house on the block without a generator).

UPDATED 10/28/12: Wondering if or when Sandy will be coming to a neighborhood near you? Just type your zip code into the NBC News Hurricane Tracker to find out! Also, I don't know about all of you but having been through several severe storms and having lost power on several occasions, I am at the point where I find the constant updates and phone calls about Hurricane Sandy annoying. WTF are we supposed to do (other than have water and flashlights and batteries and non-perishable foodm etc. on hand), get chain saws and start sawing every suspicious tree limb and tree near or next to a power line? In other news, our Superintendent of Schools just called to say that there will be no school this Monday and Tuesday.