WTF?!

It all started off like any other evening. I was sitting in my favorite reading chair in the living room absorbed in my book while Brad was at ball. At about 7 oclock I saw a couple of flashes of lightning in the distance and thought to myself that I'd probably see a storm that night, but likely nothing big.

At about 8, the wind picked up and it started to rain. The lightning and thunder was intense. A few minutes later, the hail started. I watched out the window as the marble sized pellets struck the ground so hard they bounced almost 2 feet off grass and pavement. They were falling so fast all I could see was the bouncing, making it look like the ground was spitting them up.

Then it got louder, and the hail mixed with sheets of rain blown sideways in waves. The hail started to fall harder and all I could hear was the thunder of it beating sideways against our front window and the ugly tin awning over the kitchen window. Brad called to tell me that he was stopped under a tree to try to keep the truck from being too damaged by the hail. I couldn't hear him anymore though, the storm was howling so severely, and the hail was battering the house too strongly. I hung up just before the power went out and I moved Nibbler's cage from it's place by the front window, just in case the hail would shatter it. I stood in the middle of the living room and stared out the window, but the rain and hail were so thick I couldn't see across our little street.

That only lasted for a couple of minutes, though my ears felt like it had gone on for much longer.

The hail let up and a few minutes later Brad pulled up in the driveway and moved my flower pot out of the brunt of the rain. Unfortunately, the front garden couldn't be saved. (I'm hoping that the marigolds are sturdy enough to bounce back).

We stayed in the house until the rain let up and blue sky appeared as suddenly as it had gone. Then we went for a drive to survey the damage.

The wind had blown a few trees down, but mostly it had blown so many leaves off the branches that they had clogged the storm sewers, effectively flooding the streets. One person's shed was crumpled on a boulevard across the street from it's home, another resident lost their trampoline...who knows where that ended up! And the power was out for 2.5 hours. Our siding is dented, but the car and truck didn't get damaged at all. And thankfully, just before the storm hit, I had the forsight to run outside and cover up Scoots, so there was no damage there either.

City Crews clearing away the clogged stormdrains
~The South Side of the city. Where we stopped to take this picture the water was almost at the runningboards on the Escape.
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My poor little garden. :(
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~Jon Keen was out after the storm taking pictures as well. These ones came from him:

But it's all about making the best of a bad situation...apparently there were people tubing down Cheadle Street, and I saw at least a dozen people having a water fight in the puddles in parking lots.