Stormy Weather

The weekend started off great. When I got home from work Friday Will helped me pull out the summer clothes, and I found an Easter outfit for Matthew to wear to the wedding Saturday. Then Ceil and I made it out the door for dinner alone at El Porton, and also checked out TJMaxx and Borders. There I checked out Lang’s latest issue of Striker magazine. Inside there was a photo of Lang interviewing David Beckham. Later Lang told me since Beckham was so handsome, he got the photo editor to touch up his own picture a little.

Ceil stayed up late. I was checking Doppler radar, and she joined me when Harry Connick Jr. was talking to Letterman. My figuring was right…we were woken by emergency sirens at 3:45 am. All the stations were saying the brunt of the storm was passing several miles to the north, at 4:17am. When I retuned upstairs to report this to Ceil, it appeared there was a police car outside with its lights flashing. It turned out to be the lightning, just about a constant stream of flashing. Hardly any thunder. Later one TV station’s Lightning Tracker counter was increasing constantly, quickly passing the 900 mark.

To be safe I carried the kids downstairs to sleep on the sofas, but they woke up and watched TV with us. The wind blew and it rained, but there was little debris in our neighborhood. I had a 9 am meeting west of Crabapple, a hard hit area. I passed right by the destroyed carwash that made the Sunday AJC cover. On the way home a different way I found Mabry Road was still closed. Two old ranch houses on 92 had trees through the roof, and on Sandy Plains I saw Alan Daniels outside his church, Cobb Community, with pines down out front.

I was near the house of the friends whose dog we were sitting. Since there was so much debris there near Jefferson Township, I checked on their house. Both neighbors had trees down in their backyards. One hit the corner of the house next door, then demolished the deck. Most neighborhood roofs would need to be replaced, including our friend’s. Most of the young Bradford Pears in the neighborhood were damaged. By Sunday much of the mess had been cleaned up.

Anna and Matthew’s old pals Lilly and Sam were visiting from Charlotte, on their way to Destin. This delayed Ceil’s shopping trip to get Will’s wedding attire, but we made it down to Buckhead on time. After the wedding we made a quick stop at Lenox. Feeling stuffy from wearing nice clothes for so long, when we got home I changed into shorts and sandals…and promptly got sick from the chilly evening.

Sunday I rushed home from church to watch the end of the Masters third round, did some raking, and took the kids to play. We had to leave the Masters when the final groups were finishing the front nine, but we had a nice dinner at Pappasitos. Perhaps tonight we’ll make progress on the unfinished winter/summer clothing changeover.

Both boys practice today, and has a game Thursday, the same time as Matthew’s practice.