Saturday, May 31, 2008

It takes a neighborhood to survive a tornado

When multiple tornadoes are within a few miles of Kokomo and heading directly our way, I get worried. When there is a tornado coming within 2 miles of my house, I run for the neighbor's house. In fact, about 20-25 people do! Apparantly, there are few basements within shouting distance of our house. Fortunately, our neighbor has a key to the house that does have a basement...and can let us all in even when these basement-endowed neighbors aren't home!! So about 8 adults and a slumber party full of girls later, we weathered the storm just fine. Imagine that conversation when the homeowners return: "Welcome back; we hope that you don't mind that we had a little bit of a tornado party in your basement while you were gone. Oh, but don't worry. Someone picked up that pair of underwear that was on the stairs. Thansk for being a good neighbor!" Our cats, however, were not pleased about being locked in the bathroom. It's not like we could easily bring them with us, and that is the safest room in the house. It makes sense as much as they don't like it.

So this is the finishing touch on an abnormal day. It was Ben's last day of school (seriously...how is it that I still have 2 when every other school in the area is done??), we bought 2 new recliners, sold one (go figure), FINALLY got rid of my hideous, broken, scratchy, what-was-my-dad-thinking-when-he-got-this-for-me orange couch, picked up our new couch, moved it into our living room, somehow managed to move the old couch into the office (seriously not much space in that room now), I went summer school clothes shopping (who does that?!?), and Ben still fit in a couple of graduation parties just for fun. And then the day ended with prayers of relief and thanks that my house is still standing and we are not dead.

As fascinating as storms can be...they are seriously scary to me.

"Weather forecast for tonight: dark. Continued dark overnight, with widely scattered light by morning." George Carlin

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