Journal, hour one
I arrived home about 7 PM on Monday August 11 2003, I'm home for no more than 30 minutes when the person who lives above me starts making a lot of racket It sounds like he's throwing a shit-ton of golf balls at my ceiling. Wait, I live n the top floor! So I walk to the East window and it sounds like hell is tearing loose outside. I peek and it looks like Omaha beach outside! It was hailing..horizontally....at my wall. All this lasted tops maybe 5 minutes but it was like WOW! Uncle nature was beating the hell out of everything! I tried to open the vertical blinds to look out on the back porch but there's a hornet hanging out there. So I dispatch him using Dr. Martin first. The head gets knocked off and I don't know why but I put the head on the bar .... Trophy maybe. I'll mount it over the fireplace later.
Then the power goes out. In this Apartment the power goes out if you burp loud ..... so now I have no electricity. As I'm looking for a flashlight I remember my truck outside. The hail came from the East but the cars are parked on the West side of the building so I'm relatively sure it's
safe but I decide to go check anyway. Outside the storm has blown down a fence .... ...... BIG STORM! Other than being covered with 6 billion flowers and leaves the truck is in good shape. As I'm coming back inside I pass my neighbor coming out to look and she's talking to her friend,
" Woooooweee that was a big one" she said.
I said "......... yea"
"But It looks like your truck and all the other cars are ok though"
(me) "Yea that was rough"
(her) "Rough and hard!"
(are we talking about the same thing???)
As I go back up the stairs she says "Girl, that was a mini toe-nado! I tell you that was a MINI TOE-NADO! Wooo lahdie! If ever I see......." was the last thing I heard as I shut the door.
Well now I have nothing to do so I go back and forth from the front porch to the back to look at the sky because its looking pretty neat now. Some clouds are going left and some are going right .....I wonder if thats bad ...I find the flashlight and thats when I notice the hornet head on the counter.
It's still moving. It's been about fifteen minutes since I killed it and the antennae and the mandibles are moving. I pick it up to look more closely and I can see it's neck hole swallowing, .... cool .... sick. I put it down to check it later and go outside and find some hail the size of a nickel. It hailed like a son-of-a-bastard out there. Going back inside I notice I haven't seen the cat in a while. she's not in her cat bonsai bottle She must be flying half way to Albuquerque by now on a "toe-nado" Bored now so I try the phone; just to see; AND IT WORKS! Apparently
electricity works on .....electricity, but phones must run on butane or something.
Forty minutes now, check the head....still moving , weird. Hmm what about the rest of it? Dead as a doornail so I throw it away so I don't step on it later.
1 hour later
Still no power, Take your time guys, Monday TV sucks. One hour and forty-five minutes later the power kicks back on and the cat comes out from her fall out shelter under the bed.
All is well.