Typhoon Prep
Fung Wang looks set to hit mid-Taiwan head on, so I’ve cancelled my private classes today and invited my buddies over for a tea party tonight! With any ‘luck’ tomorrow will be a day off as well. While last week’s typhoon was mild but brought heavy rains, this storm is predicted to have much stronger winds, and we’re already feeling the frontrunners of those as I write this (Sunday, 7/27, 2pm).
My first job after a late breakfast was to go out and secure my yard a bit better. I have a tarped roof over my picnic table, which we use for BBQ and tea drinking. I’m quite proud of it because I designed and built it myself (after a fair amount of trial and error), and it’s lasted for 4 years now. Fortunately, It’s built to be taken down quickly.
I start by taking out the bamboo supports that keep the tarp from sagging. Then it’s just a matter of unhooking the bungee cord (a great idea) from the hooks (I used 3″ cement wall anchors for the hooks – another great idea). After rolling the tarp off the frame, I wrap it around my lawn furniture, and tie everything down. If the winds get too strong, I can unbolt the frame and have it down in about 5 minutes, but usually I just tie it down as well. With the center of the storm coming across central Taiwan, I think we’ll be OK.
We’ll also tape our large picture windows (this keeps the glass from flying around if the windows break), 
but nobody here ever boards up their shops or houses like in the US. This is a shot of our upstairs balcony (off of the Teaboy’s bedroom). Three summers ago, the roof came off, and the windows shattered out (we 
still find broken glass in the yard). Last year, the wind was stong enough to take the paint off of this retaining wall, but the house didn’t have any damage.
These shots don’t show it very well, but the clouds are moving in really fast now. In any case, this is the view from our front yard (looking East). The post-typhoon weather is usually very clear, and I’ll try to get better shots Monday or Tuesday.
Oh, by the way, the bug in the opening shot is some kind of moth I found sleeping under some stuff – just thought it had cool markings, so I included the shot. 