Whoops -- got caught posting these thoughts in the midst of the new thread opening up, so I'll quickly repost here.

Turning in for the night here as well, thankfully with power. Came home to a nice surprise earlier in that the power was restored a full day before they expected it, which is always good. The ice in the freezer and fridge didn't even have time to melt, but I'm certainly glad I had the materials and losses were avoided. I can only hope and pray that everyone to the west made it out alright and that this is the last storm we'll have to deal with as a community this year. Unfortunately, Jeanne may have other designs on that, but this is just getting ridiculous...and we've only gone 6 weeks into the season.

Ivan certainly served up some humble pie on my end and will be a learning experience for all of the forecasters and models involved. Whether the models were too far right and needed to shift left early in its life or too far left and needed to shift right late in its life, the overall errors with this storm are going to be rather large...even in intensity. The NHC did the best they could and proved once again why they are the experts, pinning down a large location that could be affected by the storm with enough time to get prepared as well as pinpointing a region that might come under the gun -- the Mobile/Pensacola area -- a couple of days in advance. They and all other forecasters will always be limited by the data we have available, whether that is in the form of models, observations, or something else entirely, but things are gradually improving. This storm humbled many a forecaster and proved how two competent, respected forecasters can come up with entirely different scenarios as to what will happen and have both come within a fraction of being right...yet both end up wrong.

Best of luck to everyone in the path of this beast, and take care all.