I finally got my power (the whole street) back on today, after being off for a full week. Gainesville really could use a break, after all the downed/uprooted trees and loss of power. According to the local forecasters, we received strong tropical force winds here - not even hurricane force - although some gusts were over 80 mph. Because of our proximity to Frances as she went across the state, we received nasty weather for almost two whole days. I wanted to see a hurricane, since we saw nothing of Charley, but living without power for a week is no fun. I'd still honestly like to see some bands from Ivan, but nothing over 50 mph gusts this time. With all the recent rain we've had, I'm sure many trees would uproot even more easily the second time around (and Gainesville has a LOT of trees, for anyone who doesn't know that.) A battery powered tv is a handy thing to have, as long as you can receive local stations. If I didn't have that, I'm sure the whole experience would have been a lot more unnerving. My neighborhood has a lot of very tall trees, and it was fascinating watching the 'waves' of wind travelling through the trees. It also makes an eerie sound, sort of like a few jet engines off in the distance. We lost about 6 or 8 large trees on my street of about 30 or 40 houses. I believe 90 homes in the county were 'total losses.' There is still a lot of electrical work to be done here (and removal of an obscene amount of fallen tree material.) I realize the chance of Ivan hitting Gainesville with 100+ mph winds is probably about 1% or less, but that would be a real disaster, all things considered.