New Year’s Eve 2004 and we were at the Suncoast Resort working then bringing in the 2005 Holiday Year. It was extremely COLD that New Years Eve. There was a sold out hotel 3 day min stay weekend and as always a big name concert in the huge outdoor courtyard…  then at 11 PM the unthinkable started to happen. There was a huge unexpected rain downpour that lasted all night.

    The next morning after waking up pretty late (wink wink) we soberly drove back to our home in Tampa.

    Going down our alley and parking in the garage we then went walking slowly into the backdoor of our home. The phone rang and it was a neighbor excited who asked, “Are you all OK and how is your home?”

    We asked why and our friend said, “Go look at your front door!”

    We walked outside and to our surprise the house next door had all burned down! The firemen told our neighbors that our home was saved because of our tin roof & aluminum siding. The firemen kept 1 truck spraying our house with the water hose.  They also said the hard rain all night definitely helped too.

    The homophobic meth’d out kid probably started his rented bungalow house on fire again, we told the firemen!

    WOW the storm that night before turned out to be a real blessing!