BS: Oy! Nervous Weather

Subject: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 09:35 PM

I feel silly, being as nervous as I am. I'm not usually like this when severe weather comes through.

Bands of severe thunderstorms have been moving through since about 5:30 this evening. One tornado warning for my particular spot on the map so far, and the weather radio, which is set to alerts, going off about every 20 to 30 minutes as tornado and severe thunderstorm warnings change and move through assorted counties, as the bands move through. So far, no reports of tornados actually touching down, and all warnings have been based on radar showing circulation that could be tornados, but maybe aren't.

Tornados are not unusual here, but are also not common. The last one to actually hit Hillsborough was in the early '90's. It caused a lot of damage and two people died.    But the odds of a tornado coming through my particular patch of God's green earth are really quite small.

When Hurricane Fran came through, I left my bedroom door (which opens onto the front porch) open so I would hear the wind in case she really did come right through (which she did do.) then went to bed and slept like a baby, oblivious when the winds picked up and trees started falling. The power was out the next morning, so I knew we had enough wind to do some damage, but did not realize the hurricane had come right through here until the roads became impassable as I tried to make my way to work.

Aargh! There goes the weather alarm again!   For here, this time.    Later gators.

Tell some jokes while I'm gone to distract me when I get back from the basement.

Honest! I didn't used to be such a chicken sh*t! What a wreck I'd be if I lived in Kansas.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Sorcha
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 10:30 PM

Nah, you'd probably get used to it in Kansas. Most of us did. Take all the important stuff (mostly instruments, we each had our 'assigned ones') then go back to the grill outside and finish supper. Under umbrella if necessary.

My granddad, at about age 70, flat refused to go to the basement anymore. He said, I spent my life in a 'fraid hole, and I wanna SEE one of these suckers before I die. He never did!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 10:55 PM

Low pressure zones are designed to make us nervous and (therefore) watchful. You aren't being silly. It's just your limbic brain looking out for you; women are conditioned in our society to over-ride that inner wisdom.

Trust that skittishness, lady, and take cover in the safe spot that seems too silly to hunker down in. Take a bottle of water, a comfy cusion, a blanket, a flashlight, and a pee bucket-- but do not stop to make a cup of tea.

:~)

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: katlaughing
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 11:01 PM

According to weather.com it should ease up after midnight, so only an hour to go, maybe?

Hope these bring you a few chuckles:

President Bush toured parts of Missouri that were devastated by a recent tornado. There was one awkward moment, when the President looked at the tornado damage and said, 'Don't worry, we're going to get whoever did this.'"

The U.S. has only three hurricane warning centers - Coral Gables, FL, Guam, and Honolulu, HI (recently completed). All three have faced Category 4 hurricanes in the past month. Which only goes to show: If you build it, they will come!

How to Fight Hurricanes
Suggestions collected from all over the Web

Building large fans on the coast to blow away approaching storms.

Fan Them Away

Coating the surface of the water with olive oil in order to prevent evaporation.

Towing an iceberg down to Florida to cool down the water temperature in order to prevent evaporation.

Pray them away.

Use of a nuclear warhead to blow a hurricane out of the water.

Flying a Boeing 747 into the monster storm, where it would hit it with tons of super absorbent powder, literally sucking it dry and breaking it apart.

Call the movers.


Supposedly, these are real answers to various exams:

"Equator: A menagerie lion running around the Earth through Africa."

"The tides are a fight between the Earth and moon. All water tends towards the moon, because there is no water in the moon, and nature abhors a vacuum. I forget where the sun joins in this fight."

"Dew is formed on leaves when the sun shines down on them and makes them perspire."

"I am not sure how clouds get formed. But the clouds know how to do it, and that is the important thing."

"Most books now say our sun is a star. But it still knows how to change back into a sun in the daytime."

"While the earth seems to be knowingly keeping its distance from the sun, it is really only centrificating."

"In making rain water, it takes everything from H to O."

"Rain is saved up in cloud banks."

"Thunder is a rich source of loudness."

"Isotherms and isobars are even more important than their names sound."

"We say the cause of perfume disappearing is evaporation. Evaporation gets blamed for a lot of things people forget to put the top on."

"Clouds are highflying fogs."

Clouds just keep circling the earth around and around. And around. There is not much else to do.

{{{{{{{Janie}}}}}}

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 11:03 PM

Thanks, Sorch. Don't know why I got so unusually spooked tonight.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 11:05 PM

And thanks Susan and Kat!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 11:08 PM

We've been in such a severe drought for so long, I'm probably just not used to wet weather anymore!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 11:16 PM

In today's email:

Today is International Disturbed People's Day.

Please send an encouraging message to a disturbed friend... just as I've done.

I don't care if you lick windows...,
take the special bus........,
or occasionally pee on yourself...

You hang in there, sunshine.....
you're frigging special to me.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Bill D
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 12:44 AM

Weather is nasty here, too tonight. Rita went around the DC beltway to hear Elizibeth LaPrelle, and when it was over, it was raining so hard she called a friend over there and decided not to drive home!

It is raining like there here now. I think I'll read all those jokes, then go to bed!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Megan L
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 03:50 AM

Katlaughing your little list of cures missed out the most effective(Or so I have gathered from years of reading threads) Simply stand Spaw with his back to the approaching front and feed him a plate o beans.

Damb we should have thought of that before this whole Iraqe Iraqueue Ir aw hell Afghanistan thing :) They would have surrendered immediately and acknowledged the error of their ways.

Meg heading of to"take cover in the safe spot that seems too silly to hunker down in. Take a bottle of water, a comfy cusion, a blanket, a flashlight, and a pee bucket-- but do not stop to make a cup of tea." Not happy about missing my cup of tea I am a Brit you know.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: gnu
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 03:45 PM

Oh my! Megan said a four letter word! B***!

GIOK!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 05:02 PM

Janie...I'm sorry! I grew up around the damn things and I guess I just have no respect for them!

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 05:59 PM

torential rain gives me schpilkes.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:23 PM

Naw, Sorch - Don't be sorry - I knew I was way too nervous - probably because we have had so little wild weather for the past year that I'm not used to it anymore - and my boy is with his Dad this week who lives in a travel trailer up in a part of the county where the radar and weather warnings indicated they were pummelled far worse.   (And my son confirmed that this morning.) Your post, and Kat and Susan, helped me get things back into perspective.

I generally heed the warnings and do what the weather radio says to do, but only because it is the prudent thing to do. Don't usually get and keep the heebie-jeebies like I did last night.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Janie
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 06:49 PM

Donuel,

We lost our house and most of our belongings in the flooding caused by the remnants of Hurricane Gloria in the mid-80's. Escaped by kayak with 5 feet of water in the house. For several years after that, this feeling of mild but pervasive dread would settle over me any time rainy weather set in for a few hours or a few days. Took me awhile to recognize what it was about.   That dread doesn't come over me anymore, but I won't ever live on a 500 year flood plain again.

Subject: RE: BS: Oy! Nervous Weather
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Mar 08 - 07:47 PM

shiver

I guess having an emergency boat of any kind is a good idea.
I've seen streams you could step across become 1/4 mile wide rivers in 3 days.