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No, you aren't. I'm in Hampton Roads so we get hit dead-on, but Northern VA gets its share of pounding rain, floods and high wind.

My advice is get a good generator, lots of C and D batteries, a battery run tv and radio, food for at least a week or longer and water equal to 5 gallons a day for 5 days per person for all activities. That one gallon rule is not useful when you have to wash, use it for food prep and clean up too. A good outdoor gas grill helps. And a camp pot for coffee. Baby wipes and sanitary hand wipes are helpful. As are 5 gallon lidded cans lined with garbage bags and filled with kitty litter. Yes, a latrine!

Make sure you have nylon rope, bungee cords, a few tarps, and medications on hand. If you know how to handle one, a chainsaw. If you don't know how to use one, don't. Those injuries are nasty.

It is also a life saver to have a simple carpet sweeper like they used in the 50's to keep the debris off the carpet as people walk in and out. No power for vacuums.

We lost our power for six days last year during Isabel and a week during a hurricane prior to that. Plus, living where I do, power outages are the rule.

On the plus side: Hampton Roads had the Mother of all BBQ's last year. Had to use up the stuff in the freezer and all the neighbors had dinner. On the minus side: 1.5 million people who in the best of times CAN'T DRIVE negotiating Hampton Roads without stoplights.

I know you are in an apartment, so just glean through and use what you can. And btw, keep the door shut.