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I just wanted to see if everyone who had to evacuate had a plan in place prior to the event, and also if all went according to plan. Figured we may be able to help each other out in refining our methods if (God forbid) any of us should be put in the same situation again.

I've only had to evacuate twice, with Rita and Ike, and I found my plan for Rita worked very well then, but was very ill-suited for Ike. A lot of things changed in 3 years, including getting married, and therefore I had more things to consider when packing. So here's what went wrong this time, and how I plan on fixing it for the future.

1) I now have 2 cars. We both agreed that we didn't want to seperate, so we had to choose which car we left behind. We decided to take the SUV for cargo and to leave the Civic. Upon returning, we learned that the water level got within a few inches of possibly totalling the Civic. It never even occured to me that there was an insured 3 level parking garage within a couple hundered feet of our place, with weekly rates. Next time I'll be parking it there.

2) Last year I stocked our emergency food bins with a gourmet selection of canned beans, beef jerky, peanuts, peanut butter crackers, canned fruit, granola bars, and canned tuna. I estimated that we each had enough to eat comfortably for 2 weeks. I forgot to pack a can opener. Luckily, the Walmart close by our temporary hotel residence seemed to have plenty of those lying around.

3) During Rita, I lived in a place with a gas stove, and I never lost the ability to heat stuff up. Now we have electric, and boil water alerts are great assuming you have electricity to boil with. I never thought of getting a camp stove beforehand, so trip #2 to Walmart landed me the last camp stove in the town we were staying in.

4) During Rita, I went to Memphis to stay with family, so I didn't have to think twice about bringing my guns along. My dad just made room in the safe and that was that. Well, this time we decided to do the hotel thing, since a 22 hour round trip didn't sound appealing. The in-laws said they would get some rooms starting Thursday night. Well, no one thought to tell me until we got there that Thursday night didn't work out, and that we couldn't get the room until Friday, and therefore needed to stay with my brother-in-law in Fort Hood that night. Now, I don't know how many of you have thought about taking any sort of weapons on a military base, but I'd suggest against it. It became the biggest debacle of the whole trip trying to figure out where to store them. The in-laws aren't a very big gun family, so they weren't too cooperative trying to help me. Finally, my brother-in-law's wife (from a hunting family) found out about the story and took me to her friend's house off base where there was a gun safe. It's really nerve-racking having to leave 3 generations worth of rifles and shotguns, plus a few pricey handguns in the safekeeping of a total stranger, but I didn't have much choice. Sure enough, when registering at the base's Visitor's center, I got flagged by DPS for having a CHL, and got "randomly" searched at the gate. The dog must have smelled the gunpowder, because they looked through everything. Next time, I am not going to trust anyone to make living arrangements except myself. I am also going to make sure that wherever I stay has safe deposit boxes or a vault.

5) I never really ran short on gas, but I was nervous for a few days that gas would be hard to get once we got back. I don't have gas cans, because I can't store them in the cabin of the SUV. Next month, I'm getting a hitch installed and a cargo rack to throw a few 5 gallon cans on.

6) We never thought to clean out our fridge before leaving. It would have been nice not to smell rotten milk, eggs, lunch meat, and cheese when coming home.

7) I know everyone says pack your medicine in your hurricane kit, but medicine isn't exactly something you can just store away in a closet with the rest of your food, clothing, etc. If you need to take medicine with you, odds are you need them before you leave, too. It was really a hassle rounding up what we thought we needed at the last minute, because we used the stuff up until the point of leaving, and therefore it wan't packed and ready to go.

Actually, looking at this, it seems like I only thought I was prepared. So does anyone else have any lessons learned from evacuating this time?