Wild weather weekend

I think most people have heard the news on tv, radio, internet, or read a newspaper. An EF2 tornado hit downtown Atlanta late Friday evening. There were no warning alerts, it popped up and the weather people didn't think it would happen in downtown. From the news reports so far, that Friday night, there were no deaths, but a lot of damage to the area. That was very lucky considering that is a very congested area.

But there were more tornadoes the next day. We had an idea there would be strong thunderstorms and possible tornadoes for Sat. Let me back up; We finally went to bed about 3am. Goof and I were watching the news and having a bit of an argument about cleaning- garage, basement, and laundry room. Stinky had fallen asleep on the sofa, and hey it's the weekend, no bigger if he wants to sleep there. We had heard there were to be thunderstorms during the night, and considered with the extreme weather Atlanta just had, it might be bad for us.

Off to bed the adults went. It took me a while to fall asleep as I had that horrible irritated dry cough. We woke up to the NOAA radio alert going off. I was miserable! I had just fallen asleep it seemed like after all the coughing I did, to have to hope my chest didn't start up again, and get some more rest. Goof had me go downstairs to sleep, so he took the loveseat, and I took a corner on the sofa next to Stinky. The thunderstorm hit around 6am. It was loud and violent I gather. I was so exhausted, I really didn't want to wake up. But somehow around 8:30am, I woke up, and it was sunny. We didn't have much damage, and Stinky had no idea why I was sleeping on the sofa with him. It seems Goof woke up before Stinky and went back to bed.

The rest of the day we had the news on. Well there seemed to be nothing but news about the tornado. The NOAA alert radio kept going off every few hours. Extending tornado warnings, alerting that we were under watch for severe thunderstorms. We watched CNN, as they showed the damage done to their building and other buildings. The damage was extensive again, it was amazing that not many people were hurt. What was scary Saturday was the fear of more sever storms coming across Alabama heading towards us. There were a few more tornadoes that popped up. Two people were killed in Floyd county. There was hail in the storms that were 4 inches! Baseball sized hail! That will ruin your cars, and tear the roof and siding off your house! Now this extreme weather was heading eastward along I20 towards the Carolinas. We were still watching the weather sites. There were storms heading towards me.

Because of the warm front and the cold storms, violative storms were building up. A few storms coming up from the south and headed northeast, they would pass by or hit us. At about 6pm we got a very strong thunderstorm. The eye passed directly over us. We had watched the radar for over an hour about this storm. This one also had huge hail and we were worried about it. The storm was loud and strong. Hail was coming down but it had lost some of it's power so they were only pea or marble sized hail. At one point we did head down to the basement just in case. The storm only lasted 20 min. Right after it passed the sun came out and the birds were chirping again. Again, we were lucky no fallen trees or power lines. The worst we saw was a tree limb in Babymama's ugly fence. Which they pulled out, and bent the top of the fence even more so.

All this activity on the weather front is tiring for a person. Just earlier Friday I had watched the news and heard talk about spring officially here. I had taken out the spring/summer clothes, and packed away the winter stuff. I had mentioned to Goof how drastic the weather can be here. Just last Sat there was snow flurries, then two days later it was in the high 70's. Spring had come with a vengeance. Yesterday it was sunny and gorgeous. The dogs kept going out to lie on the deck. Mingy wanted me to sit in the grass with him. We were all so excited to see warm sun. But I do have to wonder. Why am I here again? Given the choice of earthquakes or tornadoes. I would take an earthquake any day. Why? Well they don't happen daily during the spring. You don't ignore the warnings because there are always warnings. Earthquakes happen when they do. You keep an earthquake kit, and train yourself how to turn off gas and water. Tornado watches make me want to stay close to home near the basement. How can you get anything done this way?