So, some post-storm coverage from my family: they've got power back, and have since the weekend. So that's covered the most important thing. My parents' Internet has gone out, but there's no clear way to tell whether that's because the cable modem is screwed up or because Verizon is Verizon. I did try helping her out some, but I barely know what's going on with that as it is, and the notes I left in Post-It form on the inside of the kitchen cabinet usually only help me get to where I can meet Verizon's technical support with, ``Yes, I logged in to 192.whatever.whatever.whatever'', and the phone number they gave us for Mac-aware tech support hasn't worked in months. It's not even that it doesn't got to the right department anymore; it isn't even in service. Running out of numbers, Verizon? So I confessed ignorance and my parents, I hope, are working through it with them and using the Internet at Starbucks.
My mother, by the way, showing the sort of tenacity which --- well, that's an astounding family secret maybe not Google's business --- went to her office the first day power was back, although absolutely none of her clients showed up, possibly because twelve-ninths of the state was out of power, gas rationing was being put on, and there was a 7-to-7 curfew. But she got to her post.
My father potentially has a fair bit of work in fixing up the homes of people whose homes he fixes up per need. It's hard to say, since most of them live near the Shore and they're really, really socked. He got a bit of ill-wind business after Hurricane Irene last year, including the lugging around of sacks of Quikrete that convinced his doctor there was no need for a stress test on his heart, mere weeks before he had his emergency heart surgery. Anyway, he's more busy making sure they're OK than whether they need a new basement or maybe the house floated back to their neighborhood.
My sister-in-law is apparently distressed that her child has missed a week of school, due to the closures. My father says she's worried about my niece falling behind, although he and I can't figure out of whom. Possibly it's related to the stress of finding power and Internet while mostly alone with a five-year-old while her husband lives up to the transit agency's demands.
Trivia: On 23 April 1922 the Toms River, New Jersey, beach patrol reported seeing a fireball fall into Barnegat Bay; huge waves washed ashore minutes later. Source: Rain of Iron and Ice, John S Lewis.
Currently Reading: The Silicon Man, Charles Platt. I find it wholly credible that the people working a fairly secret military-funded research project into uploading brains to computers would, when they find an FBI agent getting too close to their little illegal arms manufacturing sideline, choose to kill him whilst uploading his brain into their computer system and then throw his corpse (presumably sans brain) into his car and drive it off the freeway like a 70s cop show. Also that after an uploaded mind/virus hybrid ensures that no networked computer anywhere can be used by any government agency for anything but any corporation computer can do whatever it wants there's going to be a near-utopian ideal of freedom and equality and of course people in space, especially now that people can choose to kill themselves in favor of their brain-uploads into computers where their thoughts and feelings can be easily manipulated by their super-users. This is a book I recall reading with mild fondness in the early 90s but either I missed the hard Analog loopiness or the Suck Fairy's been lightly dusting it, which happens.