Last year, Rob Williams blogged about his experience with the four hurricanes that affected Florida.

Thursday, Rob posted, "Here we go again." Except, unlike the first three hurricanes that affected Florida in 2004, Arlene's initial target is the northern Gulf coast.

My wife and I were awakened this morning by our Midland 74-200 NOAA Weather Radio as it announced a Tornado Watch for our area. After a few minutes, we went back to bed, knowing that the meteorologists at NWS Tallahassee were vigilantly watching the Doppler radars and listening for calls from SKYWarn Weather Spotters, law enforcement, and emergency management personnel. The Weather Radio will keep us apprised of any warnings (like the Special Weather Statement issued at 1:28 PM Eastern warning us of a spiral band moving towards us).

My wife and I are doing fine, but I thought it would be good to record some thoughts on Arlene. We've had pretty continuous cloud covert, intermittent drizzle and rain, and occasional wind gusts (probably about Beaufort Scale 4 or 5, but I haven't been watching the windows continuously); but we are about 225 miles from the center of Arlene. We'll see what this spiral band brings, and I'll post as conditions permit and as needed.

In the interim, be in prayer for those in Pensacola, who have still not recovered from last year's Hurricane Ivan.

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