Hurricanes in Oklahoma...

Well, we didn't have an actual hurricane in Oklahoma...

But a tropical storm?

Here?





By "hurricane and tropical storm standards", it would be considered a small one.


Even so, the remnants of Tropical Storm Erin certainly did cause some problems for us this Sunday.








And sadly, there were those who did not survive the storm and its flood waters.


Our prayers are with those families as they mourn their loss.


Here at my house I was quite fortunate.

And I have to admit that I slept through the entire event and wasn't aware of what was going on.

At all.

I woke up to quite a surprise this morning.

The high wind had torn off one of my porch lights...

And twisted off a fairly good sized tree limb and countless other smaller limbs and leaves.




And the rain flooded my yard.





But only it was only a few inches deep.

I had other plans for my Sunday, but I ended up picking up the yard instead.



Once again I find myself counting my blessings...

And have been protected from the severe forces of nature.


You guys have a great week.


later...

Spring Rains...

We've had some very, very nice rains here lately.



Soft, gentle, and steady...



Perfect for God's delicate creations.



How intricate His handiwork is.



To think that He has put so much thought in the tiniest of details.



Beauty intertwined with function.



Food for the heart and soul.



And to think that he made us with such attention to detail.

Thank you Lord for the rain.

Thank you for Your Bountiful Blessings.


~*~*~*~*~*~*

These are my Bearded Tongue flowers. They are a perennial wildflower that can withstand heat, drought, and cold winters. They like full sun, but they don't like fertilizer! I've had these plants for about 5 years now. They are slow growers and are not invasive at all. I really enjoy them a lot.

A Nice Day...

NASA Sunspot Number Prediction



Today's weather was absolutely perfect.

The temperature was perfect.

The light breezes were perfect.

And the sunshine was perfect.


My grass was knee high in places. It was needing to be mowed in a bad way.

No, I haven't gotten behind on my mowing because I was too busy at work, or because of huge research papers at school, or even because I was studying for finals.

In anticipation of a wetter spring than what we have had the last two years, I had put out some grass seed to help fill in the spots where grass had died from the multi-year drought that we have been experiencing.

We're due for an increase of sunspots in this next 11 year cycle of the sun.

Which could mean more rain for us.

Australian weathermen watch sunspots to help them with their rain predictions.

I suspect that the upcoming sunspots are going to cause problems for the charting of global warming changes. We've already just came out of the 5th most frozen winter in Oklahoma history.

My seed received their first good watering with over 5 inches of rain. The rain washed a lot of my seed away and instead of being evenly spread throughout the bare patches it was washed into clumps.

Because it was so wet I didn't get the yard mowed before the seed sprouted. Then the grass seed sprouted and I couldn't mow because it would kill the tender sprouts.

Even though the seeds didn't sprout exactly where I had wanted them to, I was bound and determined to at least salvage as much of the situation as possible.

More rain came.

The grass continued to grow and so did the seedlings.


Today I had decided that I was going to have to mow the yard, irregardless of how much the seedlings had grown.

The grass had become so tall that it was beginning to look like I was going to need to bring in a swather and bale the cuttings for hay.

Not only that, I was beginning to fear for my baby grass because it was being overshadowed and cut off from the sunshine.



The seedlings were just going to have to endure some trampling today from me and my mower.


Before the neighbors arrived en masse to do it for me.


later...


P.S.

Thanks Lynn for offering to mow my yard for me.

Wishing for Spring in the Metropolitan...

I really am getting tired of the weather.

Gray, overcast, cold.


I am wishing for spring so badly that I believe that I am beginning to hallucinate...



And I have taken up practicing the character for spring in Chinese!


Is that sad or what?


Well...

I guess I should be counting my blessings.

Our weather here isn't as sad, or bad, as this fellow's problems:


I got a charge from MC-METROPOLITAN WHOS WHO INC EAST ISLIP for -$721.95 what is the best way to get my money back? I just got a charge on Friday. I am on my way to cancel it on Monday.


I really do hope that he gets his money back.


later...


Metropolitan Who's Who aka Metropolitan Registries, Inc.


Questions...


Hate E-mail and Threatened Bloggers...


Blogger's Rights


Do Search Engines Serve the Public?

On Its Way... Another Winter Storm...

I don't think you can really get a grasp of what kind of an ice storm we experienced here in Oklahoma without seeing it for yourselves.

The public schools were closed this entire week.

All because of the ice.

We had three inches of ice here at the house...

And it is hard as a rock.

Hard enough to ice skate on in the back yard!

Of course, I don't know how to ice skate. I was raised in the Hill Country of Texas, and ice is supposed to come out of the freezer to be used for iced tea...

Or homemade ice cream!


But there are people in Oklahoma who do know how to ice skate due to a few ice skating rinks that are in the larger metropolitan areas.


It's a rare opportunity...

Probably once in a lifetime...

To get to skate on ice in your own backyard and neighborhood streets.



I guess you could say these folks made lemonade out of lemons...

So to speak.




We're here waiting for the next winter storm to come through.

Forecasters still believe that we could get a lot of snow.

A lot of snow for where we are located.

Ten inches of snow sounds like too much to me.

No matter where you live.

And it is going to be what is called a "wet" snow which means that it will be heavy.

There have been several roof collapses from the ice storm that we had. There are warnings that there may be more from this snowfall.


In other ice related Oklahoma news...

A local news station's helicopter pilot used his aircraft to rescue a deer from a frozen lake.

The Channel 9 pilot does a lot of flying around the state of Oklahoma chasing tornadoes and stuff like that...

I've always enjoyed watching Mason Dunn's videos.

But his coverage of a rescue operation of a stranded deer stuck in the ice and water turned into his being part of the story, instead of just covering it.

You may have seen it on a national news report.

It seems that this story has bedazzled a lot of folks.

It is pretty neat to watch...

And a wonderful job of flying to boot!





I went to class this evening, and I was supposed to have class again all day tomorrow.

But it has been cancelled...

Due to the winter storm warning that has been issued.


I hope that you guys have a nice week-end...

And can locate your old pair of ice skates...


Me...

Well, I'll be inside.


Dreaming of warmer days and weather that I am more accustomed to...

Like thunderstorms and tornadoes.


later...

Ice Storm 2007 Update...

It's Sunday and we are going through the third round of frozen precipitation.

So far we have been blessed in that all of our preciptation has been frozen before it hits the ground. Thunderstorms with lightning has accompanied the sleet and ice pellets this morning.



Other parts of the state haven't been quite as fortunate.

As ice continues to accumulate on the power lines, there is an increased danger of loss of electrical service due to the increase of the winds. The wind will cause ice laden powerlines to snap due to the additional weight of the ice.

This morning seven more people died on Interstate 40 and five more taken to the hospital. This is very upsetting to me as they were all in a 12 passenger van that lost control on the highway and hit a 18-wheeler head on.

What was so pressing that they couldn't have cancelled the trip?

God be with their families.

If you live in this area please take the marked snow routes as these streets are given priority and kept as clear as possible.

Find the snow routes here.

This storm is a multi-state event. The airport is almost at a standstill. Local newstations have pre-empted regular programming to cover this significant weather event.

Of course, the folks in the panhandle of Oklahoma have been suffering for almost two weeks due to the blizzard and multiple snowfalls that they have had there. Thousands of people were without power until the last few days and hundreds of cattle are still stranded and are starving without feed.

Once again, I am so very thankful that we are all okay and have electricity.

I hope that you are too.

later...

Ice Storm 2007 Update...

The news tonight reported that three people have died due to the weather and that about 90,000 people are without electricity.

I've checked in with all of my Oklahoma blogging buddies and it looks like everyone has updated during all of this weather...

Indicating that at least they are all still "okay".

My Neighbor Sue and I have been corresponding back and forth via e-mail and all is well across the street.

I know of one other person (who shall remain nameless) that is having a fairly miserable week-end that isn't entirely weather related. But at least they're healthy, warm, and safe as well. This too will soon pass.

So all in all it's all good news.



The Lord has answered prayers that have been offered up by thousands of people. Things could have been so much worse.

I am praying that those who are without electricity are safe and warm.

I pray for the families that are in mourning.

And I'll continue to pray that this coming wave of weather will not cause any more harm or damage to property or life.



Here where I'm at...


Most of our precipitation has been frozen. Mostly ice pellets and sleet.

We've gone through two separate storm systems so far with the next one due in here in a few hours.

The forecasters feel that it should pretty much be over for us here in central Oklahoma by noon on Sunday.

That's good.


Mom and Dad are expecting some freezing rain in the Hill Country of Texas.

So I'm praying that they'll be okay as well.


I have pretty much completed my five to seven minute oral report. All that is left is proof reading, grammatical corrections, and polishing with a few illustrations.

This kind of weather is conducive to keeping my nose to the academic grindstone.


It has also convinced me that I really need to save up for some new windows.


**brrr**


I did have to go into work for a little bit today.

And that went okay as well.


So...

Everybody have a great Sunday!

I trust that I'll be catching you back here...

later...

State of Emergency...

We are in the middle of a winter storm.

But it isn't a blizzard that we're looking at.

It's ice.


Kind of makes you wish for snow.


Ice has got to be one of the most dangerous and destructive forces in nature. Widespread and covering entire regions of the country, ice can rack up millions, even billions, of dollars in costs and damages.


Essentially, people like me and you end up footing the entire bill.


When we had the big Ice Storm of 2002, my homeowner's insurance increased so much that I ended up increasing my deductible.

Some may believe that the government is going to pay the bills, but really and truly...

We are the ones that really pay.


Not only do we end up paying the price for storms like these with our hard-earned money, but many people end up paying with their lives.

A man has already died today because of the ice on the highway.


In 2002, we were without power for almost four days. But there were thousands that were out of power for weeks, and some were out for months.

We were loaned a kerosene heater to help keep us warm. It was miserable, but it wasn't deadly because temperatures didn't stay below freezing once the storm had passed.

This time we're looking at below freezing temperatures for almost a week, with nighttime lows in the single digits.

Now I know you folks in Alaska, Canada, and even Greenland are probably chuckling right now about us unprepared Oklahomans...

But you have to understand that we are in a location where weather like this is not the norm. So we don't have things on our shelves and in our homes that are probably very common for you to have. Additionally, the state government doesn't have millions of dollars of equipment to help ease the pain of this type of weather. And our Wal-Mart doesn't have the same winter weather apparel in their stores that you do either.

So...

We're "frozen in time" so to speak for the entire week-end here in Oklahoma.

The governor has declared a state of emergency for our state.

I've been praying for a week now about our weather.

I've been praying that we don't lose power, because there isn't any way we would be able to stay warm without electricity.

And neither do thousands of other Oklahomans.


The gasoline generators have been shipped into the state as fast as the big box stores can get them here.

And they've been carried out of the stores before they even get them added to their stores' inventories.


I pray that the precipitation is frozen before it comes to earth...

And I pray that there isn't any further loss of life due to this storm.


And I especially pray that everyone is warm and safe in their homes...

With their families.

later...