A Huge Pine Hit by Lightning

We had quite a lightning storm on Saturday night. The power was knocked out to part of our house and our air conditioner started to make a strange noise. An electrician came out on Monday to look at the power situation and spent the better part of two days rewiring part of our house. Thankfully, it's fixed now and no electronics seem to be affected. However...

Electrician: Do you hear that buzz?

Me: Nooooo.

Electrician: There. That. Did you hear it?

Me: Hmmmm...yes.

Electrician: It's coming from the breaker box. I think it's your air conditioner.

Me: Can you fix it?

Electrician: You need your heat and air people to look at it.

Me: Oh.

On the upside, the electrician is the neighbor of the lady at the heat and air place. So without my having to do anything, the phone rang the next morning and we scheduled a repairman. He came out this morning and had it fixed within an hour or so. I asked what had happened. He said, "Oh, it was the lightning." Of course.

The following pictures are of the tree, some distance from the house, that we think was the reason for the trouble. If you look closely, you can see where the bark was blown off.

And this was last night's dessert, made from angel food dessert shells (store-bought) and home canned pears and pear honey. Yummy!

Batten down the hatches!

Batten down the hatches, there's a storm on the horizon! At least, if I had hatches, I'd batten them down. We're looking at a big line of thunderstorms headed our way. The toys are in from outside, the windows are closed (most of them, anyway) and the children have had their baths. I even took a picture of my daffodils, in case the storm crushes them.

So, I think we're ready. I'll check in with you tomorrow.

(We didn't bring the chickens in. You think they'll be okay?)

Three Quick Updates

Domino the Cat is doing fairly well. He's still on antibiotics, which he hates, but is otherwise behaving normally. Well, normal for him.

The tree across the driveway has been moved. It involved a diesel tractor and a very determined husband. We are cleared for travel.

The Farmer Boy unit study is going along nicely. My son likes the country life.

Storm in the Swamp

A thunderstorm in our area last night was apparently quite windy. A large pine tree, already dead possibly from a long-ago lightning strike, was blown over. But not just blown over, blown over our driveway.

My husband, Andy, got about halfway down to the road before being forced to back up. Fortunately we have an alternate route, a road cut during logging some years ago, so he was able to get to work.

The tree is large enough that it will require a saw and the tractor to move it out of the way. So, guess what my sweetie will be doing tonight?