At 2:40 a.m. this morning, I was annoyed awake by a shrill and steady whine from outside my bedroom window. It took me probably two or three minutes to come out of my REM-sleep daze and realize that I was not actually hearing the squeals of a thousand piglets being boiled alive as I had been dreaming, but a TORNADO SIREN signaling “DANGER!DANGER! I RECOMMEND YOU AWAKEN YOUR FAMILY IMMEDIATELY AND MAKE!HASTE! TO YOUR CELLARS, BASEMENTS, AND/OR SAFE ROOMS LEST YOU SUFFER CERTAIN DEATH BY FUNNEL CLOUD. AND YES I AM TOTALLY SERIOUS. DO IT NOW, NOT LATER. PLEASE AND THANK YOU.”
(In our part of town the sirens are a bit bossy, but in a nice way. Like my first grade teacher, Mrs. Plaster.)
So, I did awaken my family and we made a fairly organized dash to our Safe Room (better known as The Closet Under the Stairs) and I tossed the vacuum cleaner, a card table, four folding chairs, and two wood TV trays out into the hall, threw in three pillows, two cell phones, and a blanket, and the five of us* hunkered down to wait for windy Armageddon.
Which, thank you Sweet Baby Jesus, never came.
We did, however, get torrential rain and piles of golfball-sized hail, but you won’t hear me complaining about that tradeoff.
Today is cloudy and calm. But rumor has it that more severe weather is on tap for our area this evening and overnight. They don’t call it Tornado Alley for nothing people.
* Rob missed out on this special bonding time due to the fact that he was very busy keeping the streets of Broken Arrow safe. Which I am not bitter about.
How responsible of you to gather the family and seek shelter!! I left Daniel sleeping and rushed to the sunroom to press my face against the window and inspect clouds (while refreshing weather.com every 10 seconds, of course).
:p
In all honesty, I went back and forth between the closet and the front window. Until the hailstorm started, and I backed away from ALL things glass.