Thunderstorm In The Summer Can Mean Tornadoes

It's hot and sticky and it's only 5:30 am! We had thunderstorms throughout the night and are looking at rain through today. DH isn't happy because he wanted to continue working on the woodshed. But - Mother Nature won't be denied.

I love thunderstorms. I love watching the lightning. I'm not as fond
of tornadoes, although they are fascinating to watch if you can
see them through the rain. 

Thunderstorms like this are inevitable when we have high. hot temperatures and unstable air masses. Thunderstorms can pop up very unexpectedly. Sometimes they are small, area wide soakings of rain, then gone. Other times they take over a vast territory and bring rumbles, lightning, and sometimes tornadoes along with them. 

Much of the time, since tornadoes are formed from thunderstorm cells, the
rain is so hard that you can't see the tornado with this clarity. I still
remember driving down to New Mexico one summer and crossing a wide
open patch of land in Nebraska/Texas. I saw one tornado on my
right and two on my left in the wide open spades. A bit spooky, trying
to thread that needle. 

We do live in a state that gets tornadoes - most of the USA gets them. Those who don't get tornadoes sometimes get hurricanes. I'm not really sure which is worse ... oh yes I do. Hurricanes are worse - they hit broad swaths of territory and usually move through slowly, so their destruction can flatten and affect large portions of a state (or states). Tornadoes are skip-hop, usually relatively small, and although horribly destructive, are rarely affecting wide and long areas of land or cities. Of course there are exceptions - because we're talking nature here. Nature writes her own rules, and they are always changing.

Tornadoes are beautiful destruction. This one was photographed in
Illinois, and the lighting was just perfect. 

I've lived in states with tornadoes for my entire life, and I'm used to them. I have always been more on the fringes, not in the central USA which really can get slammed. But Minnesota has tornadoes every spring/summer and some of them are quite deadly. There were some tornadoes popping north of us last night, and I just hope that they touched down in places where they didn't harm people. 

This third tornado was photographed in our next door state to the east -
Wisconsin. You can see the wet road here. This photo captured the rain
along with the twister. 

What kind of destructive weather do you have in your area of the world? Whatever you have, I hope that you have a wonderful day and I certainly intend to be back tomorrow. Stay well, be kind. 

Whirling Thoughts

This month's challenge theme from Silmarillion Writer's Guild is "A Woman's Sceptre". SWG is running monthly challenges for the year and my goal is to have a story written for each one by the end of the year. I asked for my assigned quotation and was sent one I love - "An artist's duty, as far as I am concerned, is to reflect the times." - Nina Simone. WHOOT! I am totally stoked. My dreams last night were packed with ideas. Now to start filtering and walking into the morass of plots, figuring out which plot might have enough structure to hold the weight of a story within the assigned parameters.

Nina Simone is a singer whose life has been spent as a protest
singer and political activist. I'm totally stoked to have been
assigned a quotation by her! 

I have to laugh at myself sometimes because I'm so visually immersed in things. I dive in and the world around me fades. So when I'm playing Lord of the Rings Online and I'm in a snow-filled and cold place like the Misty Mountains or Forochel, I shiver and I get cold. It could be ninety degrees outside, and I would still be shivering because I am in a virtual frozen landscape. Geez! Suggestible much? I'm currently working on quests in the Misty Mountains and it seems as if I'm always reaching over to put on a cardigan or pull on a hoodie. I totally admit that I'm a weather wuss - so why do I live up here in the Frozen Northlands?!?!?

The Misty Mountains in LOTRO are snow-filled, very craggy, with some
areas that take forever to find your way through. Yesterday, while playing
over my lunch break, it was snowing so hard I could barely see the enemies
I was supposed to be tracking and killing. *sigh* I am always glad to leave
the cold parts behind me and progress on to deeper and darker problems -
like the Mines of Moria. 

It does seem that our winter has now left us and we're entering spring. I'm actually seeing flowering bushes and I'm sure the fruit trees aren't far behind. The grass is green, the leaves are starting to pop, and we're getting rain instead of snow. Of course, it's also almost the start of tornado season up here, so our summer cautions of wicked thunderstorms and torrential rains will be kicking in soon. But right now it's absolutely ideal - one of the best times of the year. I couldn't be happier.

Tornadoes are beautiful but so powerful and deadly. I've seen them many
times as I crossed the plains, and I really don't want them too close
to me. Although they have hit near me several times, I've been lucky in my
life and have managed to escape any direct interaction. 

So, for my "day off" I have a major shopping expedition to Target for stupid but necessary household things (toilet paper - pretty high on my list - LOL), followed by grocery shopping, several loads of laundry, and capped off by a nice chat with Aearwen - always one of the highlights of my week. I hope each of you has a wonderful Wednesday. I'll be back tomorrow with clean clothes, towels and linens and the beginnings of a storyline for this month's SWG Challenge (hopefully). Enjoy the day!

The Only Good Things About Today Are...

With the snowstorm stalled out over us and continuing to dump snow (more than eight inches so far and not stopping anytime soon), I need to figure out something positive to think about instead of shoveling, dealing with slippery intersections, and a possible serious problem just getting in to the parking lot at the shop. So...I'm determined to look at the positive, even though Mother Nature is making that very hard today.

I'm hoping this is our last storm of the season, but last year we had
snow into May. If this is the end, I'll be very thankful. 

The snow will finally be over by noon, but we'll have a total of close to a foot by the end of this. It'll melt quickly, but we still have to shovel out today. I'm just going to take my time today. Chickie will be late getting in because she's accompanying her mother to get some medical tests before she makes it in, and I'm sure the traffic will be horrid. So, I'm not really going to care when I get into the shop.

I realize I complain about the weather a lot, but I live in Minnesota! 'Nuf said! 

I'll help my DH dig out, although if I could wake him up later, then maybe he'll snow blow instead. It certainly would be easier on him. So...again...I'll take my time. I do want breakfast, though (the most important meal of the day - LOL). So I'll either grab coffee and oatmeal (my preference) or an omelette (my second choice). My breakfast choice will be more time dependent and I have no idea how long it will take to shovel out.

Winter can be beautiful. Just look at this incredible curled ice off this
roof top. It's just gorgeous! 

The snow should be quite beautiful, and at least we didn't get any tornadoes out of it. My thoughts go out to my friends in the St Louis area where they had tornadoes last night. They are on the southern side of the storm, so getting all of the unstable weather.

After the snows of winter we'll be in to the tornado and super-cell times of
summer. Although beautiful, these storms can be deadly. 

Even though the storm is moving slowly, at least it is moving. We'll get another 2"-4" of snow before this peters out around noon and I'll be quite happily waving it good-bye as it moves east. It's a really slow moving storm and will be making its impact felt for several more days, I suspect.

Whoever is shaking the snow globe...PLEASE STOP! 

I hope everyone has a truly wonderful Friday.

It's April Fool's Day - No Joke!

Today is April first, also known as April Fool's Day. I awakened this morning wondering why it is called April Fool's Day and what the history is behind it, so I started a quick research project. It appears that there are tendrils of roots going back to the days of Imperial Rome (although pushing back into B.C. times in Iran, so perhaps they are the birthplace of this strange tradition), continuing on through Chaucer (of course, because Chaucer had his fingers in many pies) and firmly continuing on into the Middle Ages.

This bust of Chaucer is in the Guild Hall Art Gallery in the City of London. 

Our weather goddess has decided to play April Fool's Day pranks on us here in Minnesota, giving us a cold and wet day with a small bit of snow today. However, just a bit farther west on the border of Minnesota and North Dakota at the towns of Fargo, ND and Moorhead MN, there is a blizzard and some places have received up to 20 inches (yes - 20 INCHES) of snow overnight. In fact, yesterday they were under both a blizzard and a tornado warning at the same time! I'm so very grateful that this storm hit the Red River region instead of a few hundred miles farther southeast.

Although this is actually a photo from yesterday afternoon, I wanted an old-time
feel to the picture. 

According to Wikipedia, if I shout out "April Fool" to you before noon, you are the Fool, but if it is after noon, I am the Fool. I suppose it depends on when you are reading this, but I'm writing this before 10:00 am London time, so I think I'm safe for at least two more hours. Therefore..."APRIL FOOL!" to all of my UK friends. My in-box has had several excellent April Fool's Day pranks already, the best being an offer for an upcoming clear coffee (a definite convenience for those who tend to spill their coffee or leave coffee stains on their paperwork at the office) from my local coffee house.

Some places in Europe celebrate April Fools Day by sneaking paper
fish onto the packs of unsuspecting victims. Thus - April Fish Day! 

I'm a bit (well ... maybe closer to a lot) frustrated today. The backspace key on my laptop was acting up, taking several pushes to get any response. so I had to pull it off and see what was messing it up. Now, newly cleaned and working well, I can't get the keypad re-installed properly and am now thinking up alternative methods of attaching my keypad instead. (grumble...growl...arghhhh!)  I'll fight with it for another day or two while I determine the best way to get things together again. Maybe watching the video from the photo below will be helpful since the connections are the same as what they have pictured.

I'll probably have to watch this video. It looks quite similar to the key
configuration I'm dealing with. *sigh*

On the other hand, I did a necklace repair for a customer the other day. It was repairing a single strand of a multi-strand twisted piece of pearls and faceted gemstones. Very pretty. She decided, when she came over to pick it up, that she wanted me to do the remaining strands also. So what was a quick $20 repair has now grown into a several hour $60-$80 repair and that's not a bad thing. I can use the money. So I'll settle down to that tomorrow.

YES! It looks as though our house sale is going through! 

And finally, apparently the house sale is proceeding and we will be able to put a "SOLD" addition onto our sign. The buyer had until midnight to pull out of the Purchase Agreement. Our Realtor phoned me last night telling me that the buyer will continue with the purchase, so now she needs to get her financing into line and have her bank appraise the property, then we're home free with an anticipated closing in mid-May. Although I tend to not look too far ahead, I'm hopeful that this is a done deal and that one more thing will be off our backs within six weeks. What a relief!

Happy April Fool's Day!

Happy April Fool's Day to all of you!

Housecleaning Tornado and Pics

My friend Sharon arrives next week for her annual vacation and that always pushes me into Extreme Cleaning Mode! That has become even more important this year because of the extra things that we have had to bring back from the house of my deceased father-by-marriage. My DH, who had been raised in that house, now has had to bring over the last of his possessions instead of conveniently leaving them in his old bedroom. Thus...even more STUFF to clutter up my home *sigh*. At least yesterday he did work on getting our den cleaned. He had still had it in total disarray after going through slides for his father's funeral presentation. That has all been put away now and I am just left with boxes of sharp, pointy things (swords and knives - gotta love them) and things that I need to continue working on - glassware, miscellaneous junk, etc. I'm out of space for all of these items, but I'll figure something out.

Lenticular clouds are among my favorite and these are just spectacular. They
remind me of cinnamon rolls in the sky.

I also have to do some computer housecleaning. My music has finally outpaced the memory on my iPod so I need to start making some playlists instead of just downloading all of the albums. But I hate the new version of iTunes (version 11) and have been reading hints from others who are equally frustrated about how to either reorganize the way that Apple wants me to see my music or reinstall the earlier version that really suited me better. I have always had an issue with any company trying to think for me. I tend to think differently than others, so dumbing things down doesn't really work well with my non-linear thinking. That's one really good reason why the only Apple products I own are their iPod music players.

Lenticular clouds tend to form over mountains like the caps of mushrooms.
This lovely one makes an umbrella over the mountain peak. Love it!

I think I'll treat myself to a visit to Bwana Archery today if I can squeeze it in. They aren't too far from me and I want to talk to them about new bowstrings, arrange a time when I can bring the wooden bows I've inherited to them to be tested out and get new strings, and generally start getting a better feel for playing with bows and arrows. I'm still so pleased that I inherited five bows. Yup...really happy.

This tornado is a monster coming from a lenticular cloud base. Time to head
for shelter. Grab the kids and the animals and hit the tornado cellar.
We're off to see the wizard...

So, just because I'll be a housecleaning tornado today (and laundry tornado, grocery shopping tornado and de-cluttering tornado) I thought I'd give you weather and cloud pictures today. Enjoy your Wednesday!

Here's another lovely shot of a wall cloud with possible tornado to come. It probably
is a tornado on the side there, but I'm thinking that's actually the rain and thunderstorm
part of the storm. This could lead to a tornado, though. 

Oh...and the Beast is totally gone and my driveway actually exists! It's not a figment of my imagination. Call me thrilled! AND, I got a lot written on my SinS yesterday and I'll put at least another 2 hours in today - I'm seeing a pinhole of light from the end of the tunnel. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming...

Something Beautiful After a Day of Horror

I needed something really exceptional and beautiful before diving into a post about the Oklahoma City tornado, so put aside some time and look at this video of the 2013 Earth and Sky Photo Contest. When nature turns on us it is always a bane to my soul to remind myself of how much I love her and how stunning she can truly be.

Give yourself a treat and look at these exceptional photos.

The storm that hits the US most frequently is the tornado and we have a lot of them - more than any other land mass in the world. Yesterday a big one hit just south of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and it's been devastating for the people who were caught up in it or who are dealing with the aftermath. This is only the beginning of the tornado season for us - it goes until November. I send prayers and White Light to those who are injured or who lost loved ones in this storm. The possessions - no matter how dear or how rare - can be replaced, but the people are unique and irreplaceable.

Although this picture was taken within the past day, I don't
know for sure if this was the specific tornado that hit Moore, OK.

Moore, Oklahoma, a southern suburb of Oklahoma City has been hit by tornadoes in the past - at least two prior times since the late 1990's, but this one really hurt. There is a high death toll - at least 91 confirmed dead, with at least 20 of those being children. Now, I know that in the scope of world tragedies this is not at the top, but in this country it is significant. We don't live in a war zone, we aren't experiencing extreme famine or water shortages, we don't have revolutions in our streets (at least not yet), so a death toll like this from a severe storm is of great moment to us.

I have lived in Tornado Alley for most of my life, but the National Weather
Service is expanding the borders of the alley toward the east. Driving through
the alley in the summer months we always kept the radio on local channels to
hear any weather advisories coming through and try to avoid the problem areas.

I am of the belief that every death should be mourned and remembered. Every child should be mourned by a mother, every parent should be remembered with fondness by a child, every person should be missed and remembered by someone else. I know that's an ideal - there are bad parents who abuse or torture their children. There are bad children who abuse others, or kill them, or who destroy themselves through drug use or crime. And then there are the forgotten ones - the ones who have successfully dropped out of sight and memory, living in the grey zones - under the bridges, sleeping under cardboard over grates for heat in the winters.

This tornado actually hit the bottom section, just below Oklahoma City. For those
who are unfamiliar with the US, looking at this photo and the previous one
may help you get a handle on where this happened and how it relates to other
places you may know better.

But do we, as human beings, have the right to pick-and-choose our prayers for others? Aren't these - the ones we would condemn or overlook - as deserving of our thoughts and prayers? That's the dilemma of those who "pray for others". I've carried a sacred pipe in the tradition of the Red Road for almost twenty years now. Each prayer ends with 'Mitakuye Oyasin - We Are All Related", a prayer for "All My Relations". That means everyone without exception - worldwide. So when something horrific happens, like the Oklahoma City tornado, my heart bleeds because those injured were also my parents and also my children. That is my personal meaning of faith - good or bad. Mitakuye oyasin.

Success with Glass, Squirrels and Tornados

So, the more aggressive firing for my glass worked.  I finally have the look I wanted for the pieces and I can start the beading this week.  This will allow me to work on my BFAC project while I'm at Bead & Button, so I'm happy.  I don't have a roomate this year - I decided to allow myself the luxury of not sharing since this will probably be the final time I attend this show.  I'll miss it in a lot of ways, but I have other things that I would rather spend the time and the money on, and I need to focus on that.  I would like to visit some of my on-line friends next year so I'll save my money for some shorter trips to different places instead. 

I was starving by 3pm yesterday and DH and I went to the local sports bar - Grumpy's - for dinner.  They had $4 build your own Bloody Mary's and $2 beers.  We were happy.  The food was really good too.  When we got home, DH went outside to look at the damage that our patio has been experiencing.  We have a drainage problem and we're losing a lot of soil and coming close to flooding the den with heavy rains.  Some serious work needs to be done.  On the way back into the house, I heard some serious noise coming from the fireplace (DH, with his lousy hearing heard nothing, of course).  The D____ed squirrels have built a nest in there and they now have babies and they are making a lot of noise and I'm very uncomfortable with having the darned four-legged critters living that close to me.  But I don't think I have an option right now because I won't evict young ones. 

And yesterday was an afternoon/evening for tornado warnings.  We didn't get hit as hard as Joplin, Missouri, which was hit very, very hard.  But we did get some touchdowns in northern Minneapolis and had a lot of property damage and one death.  The season is starting a bit early and with some serious clout.  Not good! 

Happy Birthday to Me!

So, it's my birthday, combined with my day off, combined with my studio day today.  I have one story being beta read by a friend in Arizona, and another that I will post later today.  My computer is running super slow today, so I'll defrag while I'm off galavanting around town, and the weather should be rainy with possible thunderstorms (oh, joy!). 

We had clouds like this over our western suburbs last night when

we had hail and tornado warnings.  Ah...spring in Minnesota.

But for having spent years walking this earth, I doubt I would change much.  This past year has been wonderfully growth-oriented.  I've started great projects, continued work on my artistic focus, gained many new internet friends, and started writing.  I really can't complain because it's all good. 

As a note of historic significance, on this date in 1659, the Massachusetts Bay Colony Puritans banned Christmas celebrations claiming that they were too Pagan.  Love it - thank goodness we loosened up a bit from those days :-)  Enjoy your day - I know I'll enjoy mine. 

Falling? Or Just Falling Into Place....

I've been trying to get an opportunity to talk to my DH for days.  It gets very hard when he gets into a work tunnel - he's very focused when there is a ton of work to do.  But I'll have to try.  He's aware that my friend Seth is coming to town (Hi Seth ... waving madly - can't wait to see you again!), but I don't think he quite has it through his head that I want to spend some time with Seth.  So I do need to tell him about that and get that through his head without making him angry or causing him angst.  It'll happen, but it might not until Sunday sometime and considering I'll be taking some of Monday off to spend time with Seth, Sunday would kind of be the last opportunity.  It'll happen...it will...

In the meantime, we did get the last shipment yesterday - aaarrrggghhhh.  I'm just overflowing with processing and inventory right now and going a bit crazy.  It was storming hard last night - the rain was coming down so hard we couldn't even see across the street.  The roof, door and basement of the shop were leaking (sigh - it's a long haul with the landlord that never seems to end) and by the time we got to the grocery store we were so soaked and cold that we ended up buying a rotisserie chicken and some veggies instead of the colder items we would usually have purchased because we decided we wanted something hot to eat.  The lightning was going off like flashbulbs at a movie red carpet premiere and there were tornado warnings for the southern part of the state.  We were only under severe thunderstorm warnings here - high winds and lots of lightning.  But it was enough that I didn't dare turn on the computer last night and spent the night beading on my BFAC project instead, getting even closer to the end of the project.  One step at a time...

Best Laid Plans....

Saturday's plan was colors and pasta. Nice idea, but life got in the way. I didn't get a chance to play with my watercolors (although being busy at work is actually a VERY good thing), and my weekly pasta had to be postponed so that some yard work could be accomplished and a visit to the local Target for some basic staples was done. A quick meal at Micky-D's (McDonald's) ended my Saturday, along with playing Lord of the Rings Online until almost midnight. It actually was a great day, even though none of it went according to my morning plan.

I think that I may do my pasta tonight instead. I really miss it when I don't get my pasta :-) And a good friend also recommended the watercolor pencils. I actually do have some of those and probably will play with them after I get more used to the properties of watercolor on paper.

Spring is certainly here. We had thunderstorms yesterday, but just south of us in Iowa and Oklahoma, they had tornados. I have friends who live in earthquake zones, volcanic areas, and hurricane areas. I live in a tornado zone. But, as frightening as heavy thunderstorms and rains can be, tornados generally have a small path and localized damage. It is amazingly destructive, incredibly beautiful, and I'll take that over a large-scale earthquake anytime! Here are some tornado photos for all of you.