the perfect storm...

i have mentioned before that i hate to post about the weather, BUT in this case i'll have to make an exception. yesterday started out as a wierd day. very hot & humid, unusual for a day in late septmember. early in the evening a wave of very heavy storms rolled in to the north metro area, the likes of which haven't been seen around here for several years. straight line winds, hail, horizontal rain, the works. the family and i hunkered down in the basement with a couple of flashlights, candles, and a battery powered radio to wait it out. the lights flickered off & on a couple of times before the power completely shut down about 8:00 pm. we listened to the storms rattle through overhead for a couple of hours before things settled down a bit, enough for me to go upstairs and survey the damage outside. there were a bunch of trees downed in my neighborhood, debris blown around, and some downed power lines just down the street. in the end, we only lost some good-sized branches from a tree in the backyard so it could have been a lot worse for us. the power came on around 11:00, things started settling down and the rest of the night was fairly quiet. this morning the entire twin cities area is in clean-up mode trying to recover from the aftermath of the storm. back to business as usual...