Rode out the rain, blown away
So I was hoping to get the grass mowed last night. I was thinking the odds of this happening were slim to none while I was driving home in the second afternoon storm as in many days. However shortly after I got home the rain stopped and the sun came out. I messed around a little bit inside first on Iron Lou’s parallelettes and then more back lever attempts, neither of which were very successful.
I then ate my dinner while watching part of the Celebrity Apprentice finale allowing another hour or so to pass. Somewhere around 7:20 I decided I was going to shoot outside and try to speed mow the property before daylight expired.
I hauled ass around the yard, assisted by the fact that some areas of the property had minimal growth, allowing me to fly over them at a high rate of speed. I got finished around 8:15, just as it was getting really dark, mission accomplished.
I saw some of the pictures and video from the awful Oklahoma tornadoes. The destruction is just incredible and sadly the death totals are very high, including a number of children. Yes tornadoes are an ever present threat if you live in that area, hell they are commonplace.
I could hardly believe an interview with the mayor of the town that was hit, he relayed stories of how people on the streets were generally in good spirits and how he was quite confident the town would recover fully from the disaster because they have done it before. Moore Oklahoma was hit by a tornado with the highest ever recorded wind speeds something like 15 years ago, topping 300 mph.
Whenever I see stories about tornadoes I always think about our road trip a few years ago that took us through Greensburg Kansas, a town that was more or less wiped off the map by a mile wide tornado. The power of a tornado is staggering. At least hurricanes frequency can be counted on one hand over the span of a lifetime. Living in an area where tornadoes pop up by the dozens year in and year out would be enough for me to pack my bags and head for calmer pastures.