Weather Related Woes

On this past Friday afternoon, shortly after 4 p.m., we had a "willy-waw" of a storm charge through town. The highest official wind gust at the weather station 5 miles from me was 52 mph, but if it wasn't 60-75 mph, or more, in my front yard, I will eat an anemometer -- without catsup. I thought I was going to lose my maple tree; the top branches were bent almost to ground level. Huge clumps of leaves from the large oak three houses to the west were whizzing across the yard. Hanging on to the wrought iron roof supports of my small front porch, I stepped outside in time to see strange cloud formations, moving at an extremely rapid pace from west to east. My daughter called me a few minutes later to report that she had seen a funnel cloud aloft from her then position of about 1 mile north of me. A funnel cloud aloft (probably the same one) was photographed above a business about 1.5 miles west of here.

"Severe and potentially dangerous thunderstorm warning" was about all I could find on the local weather reports.

The most vicious wind gusts were followed by almost as strong winds accompanying a torrential downpour (actually, "down" was not the direction in which the rain was falling) which lasted only about 10-15 minutes. I thought my lilies were gonners! I could just imagine their little heads, and remaining buds, being blown into the next county. I'm happy to report that they survived, though the then open blooms were beat to a pulp much the worse for wear when I finally could get to them.

The storm passed, and we were experiencing only a very light drizzle and no appreciable wind when, at precisely 5 p.m. , the lights flickered and went out. Everything dependent upon electricity shut down: computer, the air conditioning system, refrigeration, telephones, etc.

When it got dark, I opened a window for some air circulation and went to bed. Saturday morning's first light revealed that I, and my adjacent neighbors, were still without electrical power. Strangely enough, the folk directly across the street, and all their neighbors had power. The folks immediately behind me on this block had no power, but their across the street neighbors had power. Somebody's picking on us!

Saturday morning telephone calls to the energy company revealed that they were, of course, aware of the problem and expected to have power restored by noon. Noon came and went.
My sweet neighbor across the street brought me a container of ice so I could have some cold water. More calls. "We're working on it. You should have power in a couple of hours." Later.... "we expect full power to be restored before midnight."

So, I stayed here another night, taking a shower by candlelight and going to bed with the chickens. I awoke this morning around 5:30. No power. I managed to brew a cup of coffee by pouring almost boiling water through coffee grounds in a filter. Yum! -- and thank goodness for a gas range, even if I had to light the burner with a match.

I left for church at 9:45. No power.

I'm delighted to report that prayer must have some efficacious effect on energy company problems/delays because when I got home from church. Ta Da!! The electricity was on! Thank you, energy company employees for your dedicated work. I don't know the full extent of the problem, but it must have been pretty serious.

I've spent some time disposing of items from the freezer which had thawed and were on the way to being refrozen (not a good thing.) I still have the refrigerator side to clean out. Thank goodness tomorrow is trash pickup day.

Enough of the woes. I'm a happy camper! The air conditioner is humming, the ceiling fans are turning, the computer is functioning, I can put the flashlight and candles away. Life is good! Thank you, Lord.