In which it's a good and very bad day...

Here in New York State today was lovely.

So lovely, in fact, that I decided to hang the laundry outside to dry while I waited for Maddy to get back from an unexpected trip to pick up the newly-repaired lawnmower. I knew it wasn't too far, so I wondered what was taking her so long. Valentine said she must have gotten stuck behind a school bus.

"You hung the unders outside to dry?!" Emmaline sounded rather shocked.

"Yeah, why not?"

"But..."

"I hung them out behind the house, for Pete's sake. It's not like a ran them up a flagpole or anything." Although I actually thought the image was kind of funny.

Emmaline didn't look reassured, but she didn't say anything else about it. "Who's Pete?"

"Pete Townshend," I said. At least he's the only Pete I know of....

~*~

Maddy got back about forty minutes later.

"What took you so long?" John-John said, running to hug her when she came in.

"Not yet, sweetie. My hands are dirty..." She went to wash them.

Turns out that although she'd gotten the mower to the repair shop without any problems, on the return trip it decided it was going to slamdance all around the back of the Rogue. After slowing for a changing stoplight had sent it sliding far enough up the folded seat for the handle to smack the back of the front seats, she'd stopped at a garden center and bought a big roll of the heaviest twine (rope, really) she could find to tie it down. John-John said that she had it tied up like Marcellus Wallace and all she needed was a ball gag to complete the image. Maddy laughed but I didn't get it. John-John promised to let me watch Pulp Fiction someday when Maddy wasn't around to find out...

~*~

Anyway, that was the good part. About an hour or so later we were idly watching TV when Pinky said, "Hey, look. I think they've got a tornado forming in Oklahoma."

"Hmm, that's a rope - no it's a - holy crap, look how freaking big it got!" Maddy said, stunned.


"That's a wedge tornado. Really bad news..." Pinky said. "Oh my God. I've never seen one get so big so fast..."


Meanwhile, the helicopter on TV was having to fight to keep from being sucked into the storm, even though it was several miles away.

All we could do was watch. It was terrifying, but we couldn't look away. It just kept getting bigger and bigger...

And bigger....

And bigger....














"I never saw one like that. Not even when I was stormchasing. That thing is surreal..." Pinky finally said.

~*~

It's just been getting grimmer and grimmer all night and now there's another storm about to hit them, although it doesn't look like a bad one. We're trying to figure out what to do here to help. While I'm working on this entry, Maddy's texting a donation to the Red Cross. She said that right now, that and healing wishes are all we can send to help...

So we're sending lots of healing wishes Oklahoma's way.....