Stormy Weather - Wind Storm, That Is...

This is a test video I made with my Nikon Coolpix 5600 last Saturday morning. I suppose this camera is practically an antique already! But even though it "only" produces pics of 5 pixels or something like that(whatever that means), they are just fine for most of what I do. My only wish is that when I use the zoom the photos would come out clearer, but this isn't meant to be one of those really fancy professional cameras that let you take a clear close-up shot using a super-duper soom lense from 100 yards!

Anyway, it seems the test worked.  Thanks to the really large 2 GB memory card that Mr. Don gave to me in March in Las Vegas when I misplaced my ancient 256 MG one (original to the camera) I had no problem filming nearly 4 boring minutes of clouds scudding across the sky and it would have kept going and going except my arm got tired holding up the camera and I I was really being buffeted by the wind. 

It's been really windy here since last Friday and Saturday was even more windy!  We had sustained winds of up to 40 mph.  When I stepped out on the deck I noticed a hawk flying, hunting (this is looking south) and ran to get my camera; then I had the happy idea of trying to make a video by turning the little wheel thing on the back of the camera to the outline of an old-fashioned movie camera, LOL!  Well by that time the hawk had flown away, but the camera/filming was rolling.

I was amazed at how loud the wind sounds, and how clearly it picked up the sounds of the kids playing soccer a few blocks away to the west at the large fields of St. John's Church.  They sounded so close!

Then I thought, I should say something and see if it records.  Yeah, it did, LOL!  It's near the end of the video.  I said nothing earth shattering, but at least now I know what I sound like.

A Break from the Stormy Weather

For awhile on Sunday afternoon, the sun came out and I took some rain-drenched photographs. 

Wet squirrel on the rain-slicked deck.

The sky to the northeast was still quite dark but the sun was bright elsewhere.

This is the view I see from my front window as I work at my desk in the living room.

A few toward the southwest and the backyard.  It was sprinkling out when I caught this
shot but the sun was still shining, thus the haze and you can see blurred rain on the lens!

Another wet squirrel on the other corner of the messy deck (haven't been able to clean it
on the last 2 weekends because of bad weather) and the yard is dappled with watery sunlight.

Water Spouts on Lake Michigan

The weather has been off and on stormy today, and evidently last night too, with parts of the area experiencing driving downpours of rain about 10:30 p.m.  It was dry here, no rain overnight, but my friend Ann's place, which is about 3 miles away, got drenched overnight. 

Thunder woke me up about 4:30 a.m. but no rain fell until much later.  I think it was around 8 a.m. - I was sitting here at the computer looking out the large front window when it started.  It's been raining off and on since, although by the time I got home from an outing with Ann around 2:15 it had stopped raining and the sun was out!  It's still out, although there are large areas of dark clouds looming in the sky.

Just checked the local news online and saw this photograph and a report that three water spouts were spotted on Lake Michigan!  Very unusual, and we had no severe weather over land, no tornado warnings or wind events.

Blizzard!

Ohmygoddess!  I was woken this morning by I don't-know-what-all striking against the house with great force, raised up by strong winds that switched around from the south/southeast earlier in the day (bringing balmy temperatures) to the north/northeast - it was probably around 3 this morning.  After being drenched by nearly an inch of rain yesterday and the water in the bird bath thawing (!), we are back into the deep freeze today and winds gusting as high as 38 mph in the Milwaukee area. 

Fortunately, we were spared a lot of snow, which fell with a passion further west and north - averaging 9 to 10 inches to more than a foot, depending upon location.  The further west and north, the worse it is.  It is impossible to accurately measure the snowfall here, but since I can see grass (except where the snow is drifting), I figure we haven't got more than an inch.  It's been snowing hard off and on; right now my area is in another break.  The roads, however, are in treacherous condition.  There is black ice underneath the dusting of snow, and the persistently strong winds are causing white-out conditions along with coating over the ice so it can't be seen.  I am glad I got the driveway shoveled off yesterday morning or I'd have had to ice-skate to the road this morning to fetch the Sunday paper from my paperbox.  As it is, it was crunch-Crunch-CRUNCH

When I got up this morning it was 26 degrees F; it's only dropped a couple of degrees.  Because of the strong winds, the windchill is a mere 8 degrees F and tonight will drop to between 15 and 20 below zero F. Walking to the bus stop tomorrow morning is going to be sheer Hell.  These winds aren't going away and the temperature will fall well below freezing, leading to windchills consistently in the 20 below zero F range.  Great, just great. 

What amazes me is the juncos and sparrows.  I haven't seen the cardinals or the jays out this morning but the little birds are hopping around and flying.  How the hell do they do it?  They weigh, at most, a couple of ounces and yet they are not being blown away by these gusting gale-force winds.  I put food out under the shrubs along the north fence line which is protected, but they are hopping around the deck, evidently looking for leavings from peanuts!  So I crushed up a few and tossed them out.  Juncos all over the place.  Glad to see them back.  Now I know winter is really here. 

Can I hang on until December 22nd when the days will start to get longer again? Psychologically, that date is critical to my well-being, because I know the days will start to get longer and, even though I must get through the brutal cold of January and February, the worst is over.  This time of year is awful for me and I so look forward to the time when I know that a few more minutes are added to the beginning and end of "daylight."  I am more and more affected each year by the dark and gloomy days.  Fortunately, we had above-normal temperatures with many clear and bright days in November, that has helped enormously.  And, amazingly, the first half of December has seen more days with at least some sunlight! I have made the most of it, knowing how important exposure to that natural light is, even when it's piss-freezing cold.  

Oh crap, the snow has started up again.  Time for lunch!

Stormy Weather! And - Christmas Tree for Isis!

Ohmygoddess!  Since yesterday morning the weather people have been going nuts warning us of the BIG storm coming from the west.  The news was full of weather reports and alerts, and people took heed.

I didn't have any extra arms to stop last night at the Pick 'n Save after stopping at Walgreens and TJ Maxx, so I walked down today, there and back by 1:30 p.m.  What a mob scene!  You would have thought the world is forecast to come to an end at midnight tonight, and everyone is determined to die stuffed full of their favorite foods and liquor!  Geez.  I gamely fought my way through crowded aisles, ignorning as best I could screaming infants, obnoxious children running all over and climbing over everything who never seem to belong to anyone, and doddering elderly.  I have nothing against the doddering elderly.  I am probably only about 20 years or so away from being a doddering elderly myself, having succumbed to my 59th birthday in August but, darlings, really.  It just is not polite to block an entire aisle designed for two carts to pass each other with room to spare when you only have one cart! 

Anyway, today was positively balmy, high of 38 degrees F.  I could have waited for the pouring-buckets rain that has been beating against the house from the east since about 2:00 p.m. to just melt the snow out of my driveway, but I dutifully got out there this morning and shoveled it away, thinking that the temperature was going to drop a lot more rapidly than it did.  Well, I got a good workout anyway with the shoveling and the hike to and from the Pick 'n Save.  Good news on that front - Roundy's purchased the lot across the street where my favorite Sentry store used to be but closed years ago.  They also bought out a Popeye's and a Ponderosa Steak House which have been torn down.  the Sentry complex will soon follow, I expect.  A brand spanking new mega Pick 'n Save will be built and it will cut off a full three blocks from my walk (one way).  I am SO happy!  The mega-marts are gigantic and loaded with everything.  It will be a thrill to shop in one - I love the one near downtown Milwaukee with its wine bar and gourmet salad/pizza/etc. bar.  Want to shop 15 different kinds of fresh olives?  Mega-Mart has them. 

I was sooo relieved to get back home lugging my groceries (including my own emergency supply of cheap pink wine), and I didn't have to play race the clock to avoid freezing feet, hands, cheeks (the face cheeks, people) and nose.  Ahhhh, I love these December thaws.  It was a wonderful slow stroll and I only had to stop occasionally to wipe my drippy nose (it doesn't deal well with temperatures below 50 F).  I had some in-shell nuts in my pockets and I tossed them to several squirrels I saw along the way.

But too much rain - enough already.  I'm surprised I haven't seen flash flood warnings.  Nope - instead, I've got the local news on now - we have been upgraded from a "winter storm warning" to a BLIZZARD WARNING.  Great, just great.  As the storm front moves east, looks like my area will start to experience sleet and then snow with sustained winds of 30 mph and higher sometime around midnight.  Yep, the end of the world as we know it...  I am prepared.  I am going to make a batch of JAN'S KILLER BROWNIES TONIGHT using my patented secret recipe :)))  That's not a triple big smile - those are my two double chins that I've earned from eating my patented secret recipe brownies.  Fortunately, we won't get the worst of it - only between 4 to 7 inches of snow.  Areas to the north will get hammered as the wind shifts around.

I never have understood how the wind can be pounding rain from the east off Lake Michigan if the storm system is approaching from the west, but so it goes.

I promised 'Sis that I would take some photos of my christmas tree.  I tried some last week but they didn't turn out at all.  I think the tree is pretty, but now I am regretting not taking the time to put the gold bead garlands all around.  And, contrary to my best intentions, I did purchase four more ornaments this year.  As punishment, I had a hell of a time trying to find a spot to tuck them in on the tree, LOL!  But they were so pretty and such a deal (T.J. Maxx) - 4 of them for $5.99.  I could not resist.

Let's see how they turned out --

Hmmm, blurry, and sideways to boot.  Welcome to Christmas at Maison Newton.  Okay, let's try this one...

That's much better - at least it's in focus!  Can you see the rain on the windows???  I really do need to get a tree topper, but I don't want a Santa or an Angel or a Star. Now a naked Aphrodite, or a fighting Athena - hmmm...

Right now the top-most branch is draped in faux pearls and gold beading which looks pretty impressive in person but doesn't do jack-squat in this photo.  My tree skirt isn't - it's a couple of curtain panels I made years ago that have been stashed in the linen closet forever since I changed the decor of the living room (wherein said tree is located). I found them in the linen closet and since they match colors in the furniture and area rugs I put them into service, scrunched up around the base of the tree.  I have shopped and shopped for a tree skirt but I refuse, absolutely refuse, to pay $30 for one on sale.  Red and green won't coordinate - my tree is wine-colored (or maroon, if you must) and gold, with a large accompaniment of crystal and pearl-adorned ornaments.  The tree skirt must be cream-colored, or gold, or wine (or maroon).  Try and find a reasonably priced, properly colored tree skirt!  When I retire, which will be in about - well, never mind, probably never given the way the economy and my 401(k) is going, I may take up sewing again. 

Storm Damage

View looking to the southwest lot line.

Here are a couple of backyard shots taken today shortly before 6 p.m. during sundown - not the best exposure and not the clearest, sorry.  I wanted to try and give you an idea of what it looks like with tons of  small and not so small branches down all over the yard.  It will be a big clean-up.  Yech.  That "pipe" is the bottom half of my umbrella which was tucked away safe in the garage.  The pipe is anchored by a cast-iron base which didn't budge despite the strong winds.



View looking toward the north/northwest lot line.  A fleeting glimpse of
squirrel can be seen on the left - a sort of fuzzy blur.  A heavy metal
planter in the form of a kitty with head on a spring was blown over.
That's the first time in 20 years that has happened!

 It's not over, but the Great Midwest Cyclone of 2010 will blow out of here (I hope) by tomorrow morning, with rapidly dropping temperatures following close behind.  Sigh.  It is really NASTY out there.  The winds were even stronger today than yesterday.  In fact, we broke an all-time record for low barometer reading for a "November gale" in the Midwest.  Remember the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald on Lake Superior, the wreck that Gordon Lightfoot made famous in 1975?  That was the second lowest barometer reading on record for a "November gale."

So far - fingers crossed - I haven't lost any major limbs off my trees and the house and its siding are still intact. But it sure is roaring out there tonight.  I thought the wind was supposed to die down after sunset, not get worse!  This storm isn't moving away without a fight!  The peak windgust in my area reached 81 mph and about 30 miles to the south in Racine an F1 tornado did some damage yesterday.  It was hard enough maneuvering to and from work out in the open with winds gusting to 40 mph.  I'm no lightweight, but I had to hang on for dear life this morning when I got off the bus downtown and this evening while waiting for the bus downtown to come home, as the winds were even stronger.  The wind-tunnel effect created by the tall buildings in close proximity to Lake Michigan was multiplied many times by this fierce wind-storm.  I count my blessings that I was able to wait out the rain yesterday morning (it stopped about 7:30 a.m. or so and I was able to get to work without getting drenched) and the rain hasn't come back.  Up north Minnesota hasn't been so fortunate - wet, heavy snow, and blizzard conditions in the Dakotas.  Whew! 

I'll be grateful when I can finally get some sleep and not have to worry about one of my trees being blown into the house.

Record-Breaking Rain and More on the Way...

I've got two swimming pool areas in my backyard that aren't supposed to be there, because I don't have any inground pools!  That means we got at least 6 to 7 inches of rain yesterday.  It started raining by about 7:30 a.m. and except for brief respites between storm fronts, it hasn't stopped.  The heaviest rain started falling during rush hour, stranding people for hours as freeway underpasses flooded out; more roads got taken out as rivers and streams burst their banks.  Some parts of the city (downtown and to the north of where I am) got 7 inches of rain IN AN HOUR.  Here's a sinkhole that opened up during the storm at the intersection of North Oakland Avenue and East North Avenue on Milwaukee's site.  That's a Cadillac Escalade that became it's unfortunate victim and yeah, that's a gushing water main adding insult to injury.  Photo from JS Online, by Mark Pawlik. 

Last night it was dashes into and out of the basement as the tornado sirens went off twice.  Lightning started fires all over the city; two people were struck by lightning while out walking.  Lightning terrifies me, and I was huddled wrapped in a blanket in a corner of the house as far away from windows as I could get, listening to the storm coverage on the television.  Fortunately I did not lose my electric power, so the sump pump did its job.  I don't have a FLOODED basement, but I do have standing water from seepage through the walls and around the floor.  What a mess.  I cleared out as much of the stuff stored in the basement as I could last night, in between tornado warnings, but no way could I get it all out by myself. 

(Photo from JS Online, Adam Schroepfer, Otto's parking lot flooded, east side of Milwaukee).  Waves of heavy, pounding rain and non-stop strobe-like lightning continued on and off all night and early morning.  It's still raining out there, but not heavy right now, and the lightning flashes have subsided for the moment.  I'm debating whether to try and make it to the office.  The bus I take downtown (which itself sits in a river basin) has to travel through low areas and there is no way of knowing right now if the route has been flooded closed (no way around the low areas of the city).  I can't call anyone at the bus company to find out because the last round of county budget cuts fired all live operators who used to take calls from the public.  Now one is supposed to "check online" - but the website sucks and is rarely updated.  Gee thanks, County Executive Scott Walker.  Wish you'd get stuck in a sinkhole!

Great, just great - I just heard on the radio that most of the power outages in the area (last night it was some 25,000 people, this morning it's about 8,000) was caused by lightning strikes, not downed power lines due to wind.  In fact, except for the odd tornado here and there, there has been no wind. 

Today the dew points will be in the 70's and the temperature a high of 88 F.  Plus the contant rain.  That desert down in Las Vegas is looking more and more tempting all the time...

STORMY Weather!

Holy Goddess!  She sure brought in the first day of summer in Wisconsin with a bang yesterday!  A BIG BANG!  Photo: From Madison, WI, Jack Ramsey kayaks at Jenifer Street and Riverside Drive on Monday night after strong storms moved through the area, flooding streets and downing trees.  Photo by Katherine Davey
We've been receiving torrential downpours of rain inbetween bouts of incredibly humid (high dew point) weather, either unbearably hot or downright chilly.  This spring - in May - I have run my central air conditioning and had my heat on close to Memorial Day weekend!  Unbelievable crazy weather.  Last night topped it all.

I was working on the computer as usual; I had listened to earlier forecasts and knew that severe weather was forecast.  About 8: 15 p.m. the program I had on t.v. was interrupted by the local network weather people and the doppler radar shot they flashed on the screen turned my blood cold!  The weather was ripe for the formation of tornadoes.  And it was nearly dark outside. 

It wasn't raining or blowing winds in Milwaukee County or in my little corner thereof, on the southwest side, when this first flashed on the screen, but it was aimed right at my house, I swear to Goddess!  By 9:10 p.m. the non-stop distant thunder creeping closer and closer every second accompanied by non-stop intense lightning flashes convinced me to stop my internet activities.  I unplugged everything I could to protect against power surges and scampered downstairs (closer to the basement, just in case I had to make a mad dash for cover) to watch the weather coverage which had now taken over full-time.

At 9:15 p.m. the tornado sirens went off.  I scampered to the basement but could hear the t.v. quite clearly from overhead.  I hovered in the basement, scared half to death, for the next 45 minutes.  Should I have brought a t.v. down with me?  Should I have brought a radio?  What about my computers - if I lost them, oh my! Finally, at about 10:05 p.m. when it sounded as if the worst of the storm had passed over, I cautiously went back upstairs.  The t.v. had stayed on the entire time although the lights in the basement had flickered a few times.  And I realized then - duh! - I had no fricking working flashlights in the house!  But of course since I didn't take one downstairs with me anyway, even if I'd had a working flashlight upstairs in the junk drawer I don't think I would have risked a trip back upstairs to try and fetch it if the power went out just so I wouldn't be in the dark in the basement (with the bugs, eeeeeeeewwwwwwww) - it could be right at that moment that my giant tree would choose to crash into the kitchen, or part of my neighbor's swing could come smashing through the window.  Fortunately, my power stayed on.

I was utterly exhausted after all the tension and weather drama, and could not even think about going to bed.  Finally, about 12:20 a.m. I felt I might be able to fall asleep, and knew today was going to be a sleep-deprived day.

Sleep-deprived, you bet!  I had whopper killer dreams last night.  Not that I remember a fig leaf about them, but they sure were intense - it was a relief to get out of bed this morning at 6 a.m. when the alarm went off (I was actually awake before then, but drifting in and out of la-la land).  In fact, lately my dreams have been as intense as our weather.  Last Saturday night I don't know what the hell I was doing but when I finally got up Sunday morning I realized I had somehow managed to pull a muscle on the right side under my arm.  Don't know how that was possible unless I was sleepwalking and doing some heavy lifting, which is an absolutely terrifying thought.  Or else I was tossing around so much on the bed and got tangled in the covers, and then was wrestling with goddesss knows what imaginery beings while trying to get untangled, that I somehow managed to twist something out of order.  This isn't the first time this has happened.  But, fortunately, it is a rare event.

So, how the hell do you prepare for a tornado you can't see when it's pitch black outside?  Answer:  you don't.  When the sirens go off you run for cover full speed ahead.  Because people were either smart and did so, or lucky, we had no fatalities last night despite all of the severe weather.  The town of Eagle to the west of me about a county over got hammered badly.  Even my own area, despite no one (as far as I know) losing a roof or having their windows blown out by tornadic or straight-line winds, had visible damage that I could see as I took the bus northeast toward downtown on the lake, this morning.  Plenty of large branches down, plenty of split trees were visible as the bus rolled along.

Today dawned hot, uber humid.  It's only gotten worse as the day increased.  I'm breaking into a sweat just thinking about what it felt like out there, while I'm sitting here typing in my air-conditioned home!  It was absolutely, incredibly YUCKY out there.  I broke a sweat in the blink of an eye with no activity other than walking - very slowly - home from Walgreens, where I stopped when I got off the bus, to get an extra flashlight and a supply of D size batteries!  Now at least I'll have some light other than candles if the power goes out.  I knew enough last night not to bother to take candles downstairs with me, because who the hell would use candles during a tornado, when windows could blow out at any moment?  So if the tornado didn't blow my house down I'd risk burning it down instead?  Duh!

How bad it it out there?  My poor ankles accurately reflect the moisture content in the air - and they blow up even larger the more the temperature rises.  Despite being on water pills and exercising daily, they blow up with retained water like elephantine's disease when the dew points goes above 60, unless the temperature is below 50 degrees F.  Right now it's at 73 dew point, and the air temperature was 87F at 4:20 p.m. when I left the office.  It's hotter here, away from Lake Michigan, Milwaukee's refrigerator.  I hope you cannot imagine what my ankles look like, they are gross, and the skin is stretched tight to the ouchy point.  I must go upstairs and put my feet up, and catch a nap, because we're in for Round 2 of STORMY Weather tonight, sometime after midinight.

Great, just great.  Just what I need, less sleep.  I think I'm already hallucinating from sleep deprivation, I dread what I'll be like tomorrow morning after more sleeplessness and unrelieved stress.  That is, if I survive the night! 

Some news coverage of the storm from local television. 

Unbelievably, some looters attempted to take advantage of the chaos in the early morning hours today. I have not before heard about looters at storm damage sites in Wisconsin.  This is gag-me stuff.   I am SO GLAD those fricking a-holes were caught red-handed.  Trust me, if they are stupid enough to go to a jury trial, they will get 30 years each!  People around here don't take kindly to looters taking advantage of other peoples' misfortune.  This happened in Muskego, Wisconsin, a small community to the southwest of my location - not very far away as the crow flies. 

Raw video taken by an incredibly stupid woman (does she know the meaning of the word COW?) of the tornado that destroyed so many homes in Eagle, Wisconsin last night.  It's very difficult to listen to the increasingly panicked cries of her children begging her to return to the basement captured on the video as she acted as if she were in Oz rather than in a tornado zone. 

Stormy Weather!

Whew! We finally got the rain we so desperately needed around here. It started raining off and on Friday afternoon. Yesterday morning (Saturday), we got a series of thunderstorms blowing through, and we got the bulk of our rain. The grass, particularly my neighbors' lawns who hadn't watered, literally grew greener in front of my eyes. Yesterday morning started out cool, although damp, of course, from the rain. I was able to sleep with the windows open Friday night. As more storms swept through Saturday morning I had the front door open to catch the breezes from the east and the patio door open in the back of the house to get good cross-ventilation as I watched t.v. in the living room. At one point there were some fierce blasts of wind and downpours and I thought "tornado!" - scrambling to turn on the radio to see if there were any warnings in the area. But I heard nothing out of the ordinary (nor were there any scrolled warnings on the bottom of the t.v. screen, the kind you see during severe weather). It happened three times in short succession, and then things calmed down, although it continued to rain for another hour. At about 11 a.m. the rain stopped and I quickly walked to the supermarket and back, because the forecast was for HOT AND HUMID, and I don't do well in such weather. When I got back to the house I wiped myself down, closed down the house and turned on the central air. Ahhhhhh, relief! It's been on since, and will be on for at least the next four-five days as the forecast is for HOT AND HUMID, with Heat Advisories in effect. The Heat Index will zoom over 100F today and will stay there for awhile. The dew point yesterday rose to 74! Anything above about 53 for me rates from extremely uncomfortable to sheer torture. It's actually going to be a treat to get to Las Vegas' dry 105F air! When I got back home from the supermarket and shut down the patio door I saw for the first time a very large limb down - obviously torn off one of trees, I figured during one of those microbursts. It had smashed down on some of my planting beds near the west fence line, so I dragged it to an area in the yard where I would be able to work on deconstructing it later on. That sucker was HEAVY! I don't think the photo shows just how large and heavy it was. Later on - after another series of storms rumbled through in mid-afternoon - I noticed some foilage that didn't belong where I was seeing it as I opened up the patio door to survey the backyard. I stepped out to investigate, down by the west fence line behind the "island" of trees and plantings. Sure enough, there was a very large limb down, straddled over the fence, sort of caught between two of the arborvitaes on the other side of the fence and one of the trees on my side. Much too large for me to attempt to remove myself. Thankfully, Mr. Don will be here on Saturday, so that branch can wait until then, when he can help me move the white trellis out of the way and then heave that branch from over the fence out into an open area of the yard where we can tackle it with clippers and saws. In the meantime, before 8:30 a.m. this morning, I girded my loins (figuratively speaking), pulled out the clippers and heavy gloves and commenced to deconstruct the large tree limb I'd pulled up to the hill the day before. It's not finished yet. With several breaks dashing inside to cool off, I worked about 20 minutes and then I couldn't take it anymore. Most of the easy work is done (clipping off the foilage). I have to tackle what's left with a saw. I'm waiting for the shady part of the afternoon to come around (after 2 p.m.) Meanwhile, I suffered several new mosquito bites. I should have drenched myself in bug spray but it's absolutely unbearable to wear that stuff when you feel like you're swimming in hot tea! Yech! That's what the air is like outside right now. Me, I'm staying inside as long as I can. The grass will NOT be cut although it needs it - not until the dew point drops below 60. That hazy look in the photographs - that is not intentional, or poor photography. That's how much moisture is in the air right now - it's like shooting through fog.

Stormy Weather!

Not the Lena Horne song - the real deal! Last night was tornado warnings and flooding and strong winds, lots of thunder and lightning! Between about 7 p.m. last night and when things finally calmed down around 10 p.m. (although it continued raining moderately) we got 4-5 inches of rain in my area, but that wasn't even close to the record-breaking rains falling further to the west where at one point it was raining 14 inches an hour! (That's in addition to the 3-4 inches we received Thursday night-Friday morning). Strong winds too - I had to clean up a rather messy storm-tossed yard filled with leaves and downed branches from my mini grove of trees (back yard) this morning, and the deck was a wet soggy mess, but I didn't lose any major branches, the trees all stayed upright and there was no hail, so no damage to the siding. Polish Fest down at the lake front (it opened yesterday) would have been pelted, too, unfortunately. Today has dawned sunny, hot, but much less humid, and there is a breeze that will help dry things up a bit. The swimming pool that had appeared in my back yard last night is gone this morning, thank Goddess! Flooding continues along streams and rivers locally as the cresting water makes it way toward Lake Michigan. People will flock toward the lake front today and tomorrow to enjoy the great weather, so hopefully there will be a good turnout for the simul with GM Josh Friedel at the Southwest Chess Club tent this evening (sign up starts at 5:00 p.m.) The grass needs to be cut but it's full sun in the front (I missed the shady window between 8:30 and 9:30 a.m.) and too shady in the back yard and still too wet in both yards; I'll cut the front this evening after 6 p.m. when the sun swings around to the back of the house, giving me shade to work in, and I'll save the back yard cutting for tomorrow. I cleaned off the deck and it just needs to dry off. I'll settle there later with the lap top to enjoy this great weather while it lasts. These hot breezy dry days don't show up too often! While the elements were raging about me last evening, I was working on an article for Chessville - stay tuned.

Doing Almost Nothing (Except Shopping...)

Hola darlings! It's been an absolutely yucky two days here. We are in a nor'easter that just won't stop! We received at least an inch of rain yesterday and probably another inch today, with non-stop winds out of the northeast beating the rain against the house. It is unrelenting gloom, cold and wet. When I stepped out earlier today to shoot a couple of pics of my seasonal swimming pool in the back yard, the ground was squish squish squish, ick! I am grateful for the rain, though, because the counties just to the north and west are getting bombarded with ice and snow! This kind of weather makes one want to hibernate! I haven't felt like doing anything. I've taken long naps, looked at decorating magazines, snoozed while listening to smooth jazz and cooked lots of fattening things that are no good for me! Today after spending many previous hours over the past week or so looking online at bedspreads, lamps and throw rugs, I purchased new accent lamps for the New York guest bedroom, two throw rugs for my room, black pillow shams for my room, and a summer weight taupe/grey/ecru backround toile bedspread with matching pillow shams for my room. I'm so happy! I will move the "buffet lamp" off the New York guest room dresser into my room, where it will join its twin and make a more balanced look for the dresser. It's for pure looks - I don't put my make-up on in the bedroom, I do that in the bathroom where I now actually have enough light to see by since I had the new light fixture installed! Alas, the bath has still not been painted - and next weekend is a no-go, so it looks like I'm two weekends out for painting. The plan had been to walk to the Ace Hardware (or the Dollar Store) about a mile from where I live either yesterday or today and buy the painting equipment I need, but the nasty weather here nixed that plan. That's okay - at least I got my shopping done and I feel much better. It occurred to me today - duh - that there is no reason why I had to keep those lovely black and cream paisley pillow shams in the guest bedroom when I've wanted them all along in my room, so today I moved them. Here are a couple photos of my room as it currently stands. It's getting close, very close... I've also puttered around reframing some photographs - I am now happy with the new $5 each pre-matted dark-wood frames I have hanging in the New York guest bedroom with photos done in black/white from our 2005 New York trip. The frames that were in the guest room now grace one wall in the upstairs hallway and I added a third photo printed in black/white to add to the eclectic mixture. Today I reframed Vitruvian Man, who is also in the upstairs hall - too late to have regrets now since I cut off the top and bottom white "borders" on the poster, eek! I like the frame it's in but there is now about an inch wide white-ish border on either long side that just doesn't look good. Drat! So I think I will pull out my pens and water colors and go to making a nice scroll border on those sides. And if push comes to shove, I will craft-glue some ribbon along those 2 sides to add a little snazz. Drat - I spoke too soon! When I ran downstairs a few minutes ago to throw out another handfull of peanuts and mixed nuts for my squirrels, I saw it was sleeting/snowing! It has since turned mostly into wet heavy snow. Crap! I know if I can see it snowing through the lace under-curtains in the library/computer room it's got to be snowing very heavily.

Blizzard! Views from the Front Porch

Photos from my front door, taken about 10:00 AM. You can barely make out the tracks I made earlier in the morning going to the road to fetch the paper, about 8:30 AM.

Blizzard!

Right on time, the snow started around midnight. "Officially" we have about 9 inches at the moment, with more at the lakefront and downtown because of strong northeast winds off the lake. It's supposed to mostly taper off by noon, but there could be lake effect snow (I'm within five miles of downtown so I get it) until 3 PM. Winds are gusting up to 35 mph but are to "calm" to 20 mph as the front moves to the east. I'm taking a few pictures, figuring they're the best way to convey what I'm dealing with here at the moment. I didn't sleep well last night, I finally gave it up at 5:15 and went downstairs to look out the front door. At the time, there was a large drift where the driveway curves to head toward the road from my front porch, but the porch itself had only about 5 inches of snow; later, about 8:30 AM when I ventured out to get see if Sue, my intrepid newspaper deliverer, had made it through, I had to shove the storm door hard to open it through more than a foot of snow that had piled up since 5:15 AM. I had my tall boots on (they come up to my knees), and they weren't tall enough to keep the snow out. I managed to get to the mailbox and paper box at the road. Am totally plowed in, and the plow has only been through once. The road is already covered again with snow, so he'll be through again. There is probably a 18 to 24" of snow in my driveway, drifts are higher. (Photo: This is as much of my deck out back that I managed to shovel. Tell me, do you think this is a "mere" 8" of snow??? That little speck in the middle of the shoveled area is a hazelnut that fell out of my pocket as I was shoveling. You can see some of the tracks of the squirrels who had ventured from the big tree, looking for food). I dialed the office employee hotline after I put coffee on at 5:15 AM to hear the official announcement - our Milwaukee and Waukesha offices are closed today. Milwaukee County government offices are closed; Milwaukee City government offices are closed; all schools are closed. Last I heard, buses were still running, but many are getting stuck in high drifts. Plows and salters have been out all night but they cannot keep up with the snow that continues to fall, let alone the blowing and drifting. Entrance and exit ramps to the expressways are clogged shut. White-out conditions exist in many open areas. (You can hardly see him, but if you look to the left of the big tree below the top of the retaining wall, you can see what looks like a grey lump. It's a squirrel emerging from deep snow, where he had been digging for something to eat). I had my coffee, turned off the lights and settled down in my recliner with a toasty down throw. When I awoke from my doze about 8:20 AM I checked the patio to see - to my absolute astonishment - squirrel tracks in the deep snow! So, after I fetched my newspaper I attempted to shovel the deck. I didn't get very far. There were several squirrels gathered at the base of the big Chinese Elm, the base of which is sheltered by an old railroad tie retaining wall so the snow wasn't too deep there, so I threw several hand-fulls of hazelnuts there for them, and watched them scampering up and down the tree, fetching and eating the nuts. The older squirrel who has that "dropsy" disease was there - it is amazing to me he is still alive; it's been a tough winter, colder and more snow than normal, although this is the second year in a row we've had these bad snows. It was months ago I pointed out this squirrel to dondelion because he kept falling over whenever he stopped moving. Presently, the forecast for tomorrow is another 6 inches of snow starting tomorrow night into Sunday, and more on Tuesday. Three guesses what I'll be doing all weekend...

Shopping, Shopping, SHOPPING!

Hola! I've passed 1,900 posts, yippee yay! Today was our investment club meeting and gift exchange. We has a lovely breakfast - the restaurant was busier than we've seen it the past three months - and we had to wait nearly 30 minutes for a table for five. Wow! It was worth the wait, though, because the food is always good at Meyer's. Our portfolio is in sad condition, we only have two stocks in the black, but we're looking to make another buy next month. Get 'em while they're on sale. We're not panicking and we're not selling. Every company/ETF we own is solid and will turn around when the economy turns around. People need water - people need oil, and machines, and food, and medicine. That's what we're invested in. In a holiday mood, and with sales at the shops presenting some irresistible bargains, I visited the Mall after our meeting ended and spent a few pleasant hours shopping for incredibly discounted Christmas ornaments - I bought more than I planned and when I got home I spent another pleasant few hours rearranging my Christmas tree to find spots just so for the new purchases! Also found some incredible bargains in clothes and bought a new outfit for Las Vegas, and a few little gifts for Isis and Michelle :) The weather - oy! It was WARM today (in the 40's) and the rain didn't come, and didn't come, and didn't come... I thought perhaps we might be lucky and not get any rain at all, sparing us black ice and ice-rink style sidewalks tomorrow for the commute to work. Alas, it was not to be. When I poked my nose out the patio door to throw out some cut up raw carrots for the possum shortly after 6 PM it was raining. The rain was blowing at a 45 degree slant, the wind is still gusting up to 40 MPH from the south but that will change later on as the temperatures plunge. Sigh. I sure hope our trees and wires and electric towers don't get coated with ice like what happened out east a few days ago. Yikes! I bought more Brazil nuts and hazel nuts and peanuts for my fat, sassy squirrels. They were out on the deck entertaining the ladies of the investment club earlier today. The blue jays visited too, dive-bombing for peanuts, and everyone oohed and aahed over the pair of cardinals who dropped by. I've the best fed menagerie in town.

Oy! A Scary Day!

My goddess! As if the first round of storms passing through this morning between 9 and noon weren't bad enough, now I'm underneath a super-cell at 8:30 p.m. The rain has nowhere to go, the ground is totally saturated and I've got ponds in my backyard. Fortunately, my power has stayed on and - so far - the basement has remained miraculously dry! I believe Greenfield, where I live, has received something like 9 plus inches over the last 2 days, and it's forecasted to rain through Wednesday. Right now I'm getting hammered again - lots of thunder and lightning and I should shut down -- but you know what, after dodging tornado warnings in the basement yesterday and cleaning up from the tree fire today (more about that below), I'm feeling pretty damn jaded at the moment, so screw it! If Lighting Wants To Strike This Computer, Go Right Ahead - And I'll Send Persephone After You, Bugger! Aside from very worrisome reports of 200 year old trees along Lake Drive being torn out of the ground by their roots earlier today (when the first micro-burst winds came through) and Lake Drive being closed down (that's the high rent district - I live very far far away from there...) miraculously once again we had no deaths, no injuries reported (knock on wood). It just so happens that I have an 80 foot tall Chinese Elm tree hovering over my house in the back yard. Let me tell you, this tree survived the wicked 100 mile per hour downburst straight-line winds in storms at the end of May, 1998 and the end of May, 1999. So this is nothing new - except the tree is much taller now, and regularly sheds branches during rain and shine at the slightest provocation. Which leads me to today's tree incident - the tree fire! EEK! Sometime during the fury of this morning's storm blowing over the house on its eastward trek toward Lake Michigan, a large branch broke off of the giant Chinese Elm and crashed down on the wires leading from the power pole at the north end of my lot. It's rather close to the house - about 18 feet maybe from my kitchen window. Power lines run across the yard to the next power pole on the other side of my neighbor's yard to the south. I've gotten so used to them, I hardly even see them there anymore, but there are 7 separate wires, some as thick as my wrist, running from that north pole across the yard south to the next pole over. They run in a hierarchy from really thin (at the far top, I can hardly make it out) to the three middle "wires" which are thick, and the bottom three "wires" which are VERY thick bundles of who knows what, one of which was somehow mysteriously cut, I noticed it a few weeks ago when I got home from work one night. The end of it is now dangling against the pole at the end of my yard. Calling the electric company is useless. They say it's not their wire. So who's fricking wire is it? They don't come with labels, you know! Okay - back to the tree fire! The first tree fire I've ever had. About 20 minutes after the first storm of the day passed through this morning, I opened up the patio door and stepped out to see what the latest damage was. Yep, the nature-formed swimming pool in the northeast corner of the yard was back and yep, lots of downed twigs and smaller branches from my mini-forest, but overall things looked okay. I threw some peanuts out for the squirrels and an extra ration of seeds and nuts for the birds, cuz their regular feeding spot was under about a foot of water. So, as I turn about to go back into the house, I notice sparks and "arcing" from the power pole, near its top. Seems a branch from the Chinese Elm had crashed down onto the second tier of wires, and it was on fire, and sparks, lots of smoke and etc. were issuing forth from whatever the hell is up there - all kinds of electric contraptions and connections, I have no idea what they are. I nearly have a heart attack seeing this, and then I pull myself together, run into the house and pull out the phone book to look up the emergency number for the electric company. I find it, and with trembling fingers punch it in - to get one of those DAMN electronic voice things. Goddess, I hate those those electronic voice things. So, I have to select an option - after first listening to a recording about the horrid weather we've been having lately (yeah, like I didn't know) and how many downed wires there are, and how our local electric company wants to serve us, but it will be at least a day before anyone will answer the telephone blah blah blah. After that ends, I have to listen to a list of options and choose one. None of the options fits my situation: I do not have a downed wire, I do not have a power outage, I am not reporting someone else's power outage. What I have is a tree branch on fire on top of a wire that has not fallen (yet). So, which option do I choose? Finally, I get to the bottom of the list and get to "other". So I hit "other" and have to speak clearly and loudly into the phone which is, supposedly (somehow) translating my English language into something that the telephone understands (probably a call center in Myanmar). By this point my heart is beating about 200 a minute and I'm hyperventilating and scared to death the whole damn thing is going to fall into my house and set me on fire! EEK! The telephone says "your call will be answered in the order in which it was received. At this time, we estimate that you call will be answered in five minutes." I hang up the fricking phone and dial 911. The very first time in my life I ever dialed 911. My 911 operator (Chuck), was so nice. We evidently have this new-fangled system so he knew instantly my address and after I'd said (as calmly as I could, with panic tears now gushing from my eyes) that I had a power situation with a tree branch on fire on top of a power wire just outside my house, Chuck had a fire truck to my house in less than 7 minutes. The fire guys calmed me down and sat on my chairs on the deck until the electric company came much later. I invited them to come through the house (the shortest path from front yard to back yard), but they said they had muddy boots (fire guys with manners) and so I led them through the rain to the side gate and tried to get it open against an uber-growth of day lilies that cover half the walkway and block the path. After struggling for a little, the fire guys climb over the fence. LOL! I run back up the walk to the front porch, into the house and to the patio door at the dinette in the back of the house. The fire guys call for the back-up right away, since they were not equipped to deal with this particular type of fire (which by that point was smoking and arcing/sparking but no longer with flames, thank Goddess, because of all the wet) and I heard the dispatcher say over one of their walkie-talkies that the electric company would be here in 30 minutes. Thirty minutes stretched into 90 minutes, but eventually a guy showed up with these long thingies to cut down branches and the fire guys left. Nice guys, thank you Greenfield fire guys. I thought, I must be dreaming, cuz how is this electric company guy with the cut down thingies going to get that branch off of the wire (I'd say it was about 25 feet overhead, maybe even higher), put out the smoke and sizzling noise (that was scary, let me tell you, that sizzling, "z z z z z z z z" noise!) and do whatever else needed to be done? He walks past the deck and I step out and he says "Nice morning, heh?" LOL! I say "Yah, watch out for the tree on fire." He says (just like the fire guys earlier), "Please go about your daily business, ma'am." So I go back into the house. So, there I am, faking washing dishes at the sink which has a double window above it overlooking the backyard, and I'm watching the electric company guy do his thing with the cutting thingies. I then started cleaning the kitchen, just for an excuse to stay near the window - I didn't want to look like I was spying, after all... I wash the rust off the bottom of the fridge, I scrub the floor - by hand - I start washing the cabinets dors. Somewhere when I was away from the window for a microsecond (probably scrubbing a corner of the floor under the kitchen cabinets), he brings down the offending burnt branch with the cutting thingies (somewhere along the line he produced TWO cutting thingies). All I know is, the next time I looked out the window, the cutting thingies are telescoped back down into 10 foot poles with saws on the end, and he's climbing over the fence to go back to his truck. The fire was out - but he didn't climb up the pole to check the electric thing up there that was causing the arcing/sparking and set the tree on fire. But - as no more fires have show up, he must have known what he was doing. I was left to clean-up all of the cut-down branches and the burnt-up branches from the tree fire. I've got a pile of cut-off branches about a foot high - and that does not include the really big branch that caused all of the problemes in the first place. That branch is upside down below the retaining wall the shelters part of the giant Chinese Elm, up against the fence. It's bigger than I am. It should be an interesting exercise trying to get that out to the curb by Tuesday when the yard waste disposal people can haul it away - if I can somehow first manage to get it cut into four foot lengths. Right now, it's inaccessible unless I rent a pair of hip waders, as the low ground below the retaining wall is under water at the moment, and may be for the entire summer... How does one man manage to maneuver two cutting thingies at the same time? Those thingies must weigh a lot - and the size of the tree limb - it's taller than I am - how did he get it down all by himself without bringing down the wires too? Okay, so now more tornadoes are passing overhead, it's pouring rain outside AGAIN, I can see just fine in the dark because the lightning is keeping me company as I type and is lighting up the house just fine. Well, that's one way to save on my utility bills... There's flooding all over the place. I saw earlier today through the frantic activity around the house that my immediate neighbor to the south must have a flooded basement... Oy, on the news just now (updating at 10:38 p.m.) that the Governor has declared 29 counties in the state, including my county, as a disaster area. Yeah, it's a disaster all right. Please Goddess, keep my sump pump running and no more rain! Except it's supposed to rain all night, and one more severe storm center is forming to the southwest of us, headed our way. Will I get any sleep tonight?