stupid surprise storm

[BlueCoyote 0]

ever had lightening hit so close to you it made your ear pop?

thats only happened to me twice. and i dont like it any better now than i did then.... and neither does my 1 year old son!

 

i woke up to grey skies yesterday morning.... i hadnt expected it, which meant i had to rush to get dressed to move some rabbits around (they escape, so i just stuck them all in spare hutches because it was too late to do major repairs.... i thought i'd do that the next day when it was sunny!!)

got them moved around and covered up, then had to move two huge bags of feed that my mom left out, thankfully they werent drenched!

while i was filling up the feed bins i noticed the cat acting a bit spooky around my mom's parked car.. didnt think much of it.... figured it was a big grass hopper.

NOPE!

while going back into my house i nearly lept out of my skin when i saw a snake. not just any snake but a poisonous one. specifically a copperhead .. so i ran to get an empty bucket to put over it so it couldnt escape (we have newly hatched chicks) ... when i got back to it and slammed the bucket down over it... i noticed it didnt really care. so i lifted the edge of the bucket just a tiny bit... and noticed the snakes tail was chewed... and had ants all over it. Dead Snake. So then i got upset thinking my cat had been bitten while playing this snake to death. so i called my cat to me, checked him over (he didnt care, he thought he was just being loved on) no bites - sorry, for all you cat haters. he's still alive! and i have one more reason to be proud of my farm cat -

 

anyway i wanted to take a picture of the copperhead to show off but my camera batteries are dead and wont charge up. this one wasnt very big, but also wasnt a baby either, they have green tipped tails. i've heard they can get to be 30 inches but i've NEVER seen one that big, and where i live there are more copperhead snakes than any other kind.

 

anyway that was only part of the day. actually finding the snake was kinda cool in a bad way.

 

ten minutes later after i was back in the house it began to storm like hell and it steadily got worse as the day went on. around 11:00 my husband got a service call for a diner two hours away and had to leave. i got mad that he was going to leave while everyone on the news was saying stay indoors. he wasnt gone long before all the lightening started up. my youngest son was standing at the window looking out. Just as it crossed my mind to get up and move him away from the window some angry god hurled a lightening bolt just outside the window. Scared the pants off my kid and me, plus both our ears were ringing! he wouldnt let me put him down for a few minutes either. but he also didnt go near the windows again until the storm passed.

i'm a little pissed about the lightening bolt because i know its hit one of my trees in the backyard. PROBABLY one of my hickory trees(which attract squirrels, and i like squirrel hunting a lot) a month ago my husband and i argued over chopping down a few trees in the back to brighten it up but i said "hell no you wont".... now it looks like i wont have a choice if one got struck.

 

So the storm broke around 4... i decided it was safe to turn the electronics back on, but the computer didnt work... CRAP!

by that point my husband was back home tinkering around with some things out in his shed (he bought a boat a few weeks ago, now i never see him lol) but another storm was coming our way. same warnings on the weather channel, lightening, hail, 60mph winds, torrential downpours... it had been storming like this for about twenty minutes when i realise my husband isnt in the house. Where is he? OUT IN THE YARD WASHING THE CAR!!! and yeah i told him about the tree getting struck earlier. he doesnt care. i mean is my husband unique or are all men this dumb sometimes?!?!

 

anyway he finally did come back in, found out the PC hadnt been fried by lightening but that someone had set up a virus that killed the video processing card - i think thats what he called it -

fast forward to dinner time, he decided to grill chicken... yuck. We killed one of the ducks Saturday and grilled it along with a store bought chicken.. and the duck was goooooooooood .. the chicken got dissed though. no one cared to eat it except the boys and my grandmother and my own mother. I wasnt looking forward to the chicken, because compared to one of my ducks it was mushy and flavourless.

 

AND today some of yesterdays badness has spilled over. i noticed, while looking out my son's bedroom window that my male bulldog was curled up snoozing beside the shed, on the wrong side of the invisible fence. i got out there to check the power box and its off. plugged in, the shed has power, but the I-fence box is dead... as are all the collars that go with them.

 

Yeah so i felt like sharing my gripe....... i'm not worried about the dogs getting loose. everyones contained but i prefer the i-fence because it gives them more room to run. all i can say is Thank God my husband is working now and i can replace the pieces and part that need replacing without killing us financially. still, pain in the ass...

[dustyfox 0]

I was walking under a bridge and a bolt of lighting struck it. Had my dog with me and he jumped into my arms and looking around to see what it was.

 

Df

[BlueCoyote 0]

you were lucky then eh?

the old man that used to live across the street from me was nearly stone deaf because of lightening. he was out fishing on the river when lightening struck close by.

 

the only other time lightening hit that close to me was when i was 9 years old, standing in the kitchen arguing with my older brother. a bolt struck the ground right outside the window. he and i both ran to opposite ends of the house, scared to death lol

 

this last one though... it was loud like a shotgun blast going off right beside you. made my ear ache, and not sure about my son, since he was closer to it than i was. he can still hear me whispering his name across the room - thats with the tv set on - so i guess he's ok?

Edited June 23, 2008 by BlueCoyote