Thank You, Even Steven, For Your Consideration

Welp! Perhaps that title was premature.

As I type this, we're under a severe thunderstorm warning at 1:00 on Wednesday. I've been watching the TV meteorologists and their radar all morning, except from 9:30 to 10:30 when I made an early trip to town to avoid bad weather. Yesterday, there was a "small" tornado in a town 52 miles northwest of Hillmomba. Lifted off the roof and destroyed a bar. Yet the shelves inside still had the liquor bottles sitting on them.

Anyhoo... today's storms were predicted to be more severe. A threat of 4 out of 5 intensity, rather than yesterday's 2 out of 5. 

Thank the Gummi Mary, Wednesday is The Pony's regular day off. You can't imagine my relief for that small favor. As I said, I went to town early, rather than skipping the trip completely. I cautioned Farmer H about being out in the prime storm hours between 11:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. He was working on removing a window from the Beauty Shop half of the Double Hovel flip house. Said he'd be done before 11:00. He planned to eat his lunch at the Senior Center, then head home.

The new tornado "hook" on the radar today, over the same town hit yesterday, was supposedly moving east/southeast. But looking at radar, it was heading due east. Which made it miss Hillmomba by about 10 miles to the north.

Thirty minutes after Farmer H's arrival, the skies turned black. Winds picked up. Rain poured sideways. The last view of radar before the TV lost its satellite signal was of a red area of storms coming right at Hillmomba. The meteorologists marveled at how fast they'd "kicked up," but did not see any rotation in the storm. Hail was a possibility. The earlier storm back in that tornado town this morning had tennis-ball size hail!

Skies are lightening up now. But a new tornado warning just came in, rotation headed right for Hillmomba and Sis-Town. Then the next wave is due around 4:00 p.m. We'll see how that one goes. I'm hoping not to rescind Even Steven's thank-you.