Anna Maria Island has a lot of little old houses with little old windows. I live in one of them. The windows are the old jalousie style, which crank open like blinds, in horizontal sections. The seals on the metal frames around these old windows are poor. The fit of the window sections into the frame is not always tight. In one case, I’ve even used tape to cover a gap between the window and window frame. The glass is thin and weak. It’s time for new windows!

Ideally, my new windows would meet the standards of the Miami-Dade building code, which is the gold standard for all windows in hurricane territory. They would pass the large missile test, namely, they would not shatter if a six-foot-long two-by-four hit the window at 34 miles per hour. And they would pass the small missile test, enduring ten ball bearings hitting the window repeatedly at 50 miles an hour.