Since living in South Carolina, I have written a few times about hurricanes. There was Hurricane Arthur, Hurricane Joaquin, and Hurricane Hermine. Each storm impacted us here in Myrtle Beach in some way. However, those three hurricanes supposedly won’t hold a candle to what we have coming.

Hurricane Matthew is set to rip through Myrtle Beach and the Horry County area on Saturday.

How serious is the threat? Yesterday we closed campus and canceled classes at Coastal Carolina…for the rest of the week! Today we evacuated our residential students. All schools are shut down in the area too, meaning Sidney is joining me at home as we wait out the storm. The governor is holding press conferences twice a day. Large scale evacuations in parts of the state started at 3 p.m. this afternoon.

Portions of Myrtle Beach will start evacuating tomorrow. Where Sidney and I live, we are in an evacuation zone. However, we are in Evacuation Zone C. Right now, just Evacuation Zone A must evacuate. It looks pretty good that we will be able to stay in our home as the hurricane arrives.

People are vigilantly preparing for Hurricane Matthew. Good luck finding bottled water in Walmart. Also, there is another resource that is getting sucked up. In her press conference yesterday, the governor advised everyone to fill up their gas tanks. Trying to heed her advice, I planned to make a stop at our local gas station. As I neared the area, I called Sidney to let her know I was going to make a quick stop. When I told her I was stopping to fuel up, she simply said “good luck.” The timing was like that of a movie because once she said that I looked to my right at the gas station and saw the chaos. A station with 12 pumps had what looked like 36 cars crammed around them.

In another eerie scene today, Sidney and I drove through our neighborhood and watched as neighbors boarded up their windows. People are not messing around.

With all this said, please don’t worry about us too much (seriously). I know in my gut that we will be fine. As of the latest update today, it looks like the hurricane’s impact won’t be as severe as once projected. Currently, we are bracing for the storm by just relaxing and having fun. Although I have to work from home, I am finding time to enjoy myself. This morning I hit up a new gym for a workout (since our gym at CCU is closed). I then went over to my in-laws and hung out with Sidney and our niece and nephew. We even went hunting for the ice cream man, it was great fun. So please know that we are doing just fine.

We had a great time hunting down the ice cream man today (top photo is courtesy of my mother-in-law, Brenda).

Thanks for all the texts and calls we have received. Come Saturday (the day the storm is supposed to hit us in Myrtle Beach), I hope to take some footage of Hurricane Matthew that I can share with you. Don’t Blink.