The AstroDome has been declared full. I don't know that it's actually FULL or if they realized the restrooms, etc. couldn't handle any more people. They're sending people to the Reliant Center instead (a huge convention hall).

I wish I had saved it, but somebody emailed me yesterday an article from National Geographic that predicted this almost to a T. It's not TERRIBLY common, but we do have very bad hurricanes on a fairly regular basis (every 20 years or so). This is certainly the worst in quite a long time.

However, it seems to me as though we have "Ten-Year Storms" a lot more often than that. On the one hand, we should be more prepared. On the other, people get used to hurricanes--summer here is "Hurricane Season" and we get weather-tracking charts from the grocery stores--and don't take it as seriously as you would think. Sounds ridiculous, but as much as people bitch about it, a lot of them don't move (yes, moving is expensive, but so is renovating your house every four years because it had filthy water four feet up the walls).