Monday, May 12, 2008

Tornadoes, Rain and Wind, oh my!

It's a bad day, but I'm making the best of it.

It is 45 degrees. We have had more than six inches of rain in the last twelve hours. Tornadoes are whipping off the tops of houses just a few miles from ours. Roads are closed because the rivers and creeks are flooding and creating lakes where no lakes should be. And power lines are down in our neighborhood. Two large trees were uprooted by the winds and now they are laying in our road with great curling vines of electric wires, coned off with police and fire trucks and nary an electric company official.

So I dropped my daughter off at preschool and picked up a LARGE coffee and have been making the best of it in the local library reading room, where I have been typing away at my book. The words are flowing today (I should get coffee every day!), but in five minutes I will go pick up the kids from school and head back to our dark and cold house, where there is no electricity and no internet, and no way to keep writing. Sigh. It seems like the days I have the most to write are the days that conspire against me.

But I have a house, with it's roof intact, and no flooded basement, so I am counting my blessings.

Update: the lights are on! You could hardly see the driveway under all the leaves and branches (some substantially large enough be called trees in themselves) and some bushes and plants are completely flattened, but all is well! Writing will have to wait until after dinner and bedtimes, but the promise is there.

I'm just glad I didn't have to resort to this!

4 comments:

  1. Holy cow, you poor thing! I grew up in Oklahoma where tornados were a fact of life. They sure scared the snot out of me, but I loved them.

    It was just so crazy, those psycho things. Take care of yourself, and be careful!

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  2. yes, there is something definitely fascinating about them, especially since I've never been too close to one.

    Don't feel too sorry for me! I'm complaining because we can't flush our toilets or see in the mirror to comb my hair, which doesn't matter since it's all wet and wind blown after running from the car to the library anyway!

    We don't get them very often around here, so I'm thankful for that. This past 24 hours has been crazy all over the globe! Tornadoes, earthquakes, cyclones... I think the end of the world is near!

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  3. The up side of living on a boat. Most of our stuff is 12 Volt trickle charged by solar panels and we have an inverter and a diesel powered generator when in need...
    and FEW tornados but every so often a pesky hurricane or tsunami...

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  4. Patricia -

    I was in Kauai right after Iniko hit... that was a sobering sight! My husband and I have an ongoing debate over tornadoes vs. hurricanes. Hurricanes are more democratic, tornadoes more selective. Which is more fair??

    I could have used your generator today, but I think your solar panels would be very sad here this week!

    :)

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