"On behalf of everyone I know who has, or hasn't, wronged you, Mother Nature, I apologize for any and all wrong doing to you. On this day, I swear I will step up my efforts, and see that others do the same, to conserve and take better care of you. Can you please let up some on us now? We can't take much more."
Can you believe this weather lately?? Obviously, I'm mainly seeing and focusing on the Midwest, specifically Indiana. But it's everywhere!
Is started (locally) with some tornado action two Fridays ago. I got caught in some flash flooding in Castleton on that night! I was watching the Sex and the City movie at the new AMC Theatre... the movie started at 8pm, and it was dry as a bone going in. Coming out at 10:30pm, however, it was a torrential downpour! I watched for a bit, but realized it wasn't going to let up anytime soon and decided to make a run for it. So I did. And almost fell over my own feet as I started stepping (running) in knee deep water. Holy crap!! There's water to my knees in the middle of the parking lot! So I stop and actually look around, realizing I'm standing knee deep in water with a pretty severe thunderstorm going on... which means lightning. Hmmm... probably not a good idea. So I locate my Xterra and see the water is up to the step bar... wow, I'm lucky I have a truck!! There's water to the middle of a lot of car doors (for those who don't have trucks). THAT really sucks!
So I head home. I'm soaked to the bone. There's water to the edge of the pavement on the interstate... they design these to drain better than your average road r/w, so this is further proof of the crazy rains. I get home and turn on the TV and realize how bad it really is. Man... glad to be home. And as the night wears on, I hear about the damage on the east side caused by high winds and what was ultimately declared an EF-2 tornado! Saturday morning comes along, and the sun comes out, like nothing ever happened. Unless you were in one of the ravaged areas.
So the next week comes (which would now be just last week), and I do one of my normal work travels to FL. Don't hear much about what goes on back here... until I get back here and learn they had another night similar to what we had the Friday before! Kind of glad I missed it, and I don't know anyone directly affected, so all is okay... for now.
Then comes last Friday night/Saturday morning. First off, Friday is HOT! Steamy hot. The type of hot that growing up in FL you learned to expect a pretty good afternoon storm. Well, there was a storm alright. But it was a little more than what we got in FL. And it lasted longer than the previous Friday night. The worst of it hit south of Indy, near Edinburgh - they got nearly 11 inches of rain!! So a lot of southern Indiana is completely flooded out - the worst they've seen since the Great Flood of 1913 (which I never heard of until this past weekend). In fact, it's just inches below that flood, which was severely devastating back then. All the pictures and videos that have been in the media are amazing! I can't believe I'm so close to such devastation - areas that never experience flooding are experience flooding.
And the kicker is they're predicting more rain tonight. The front may even stall over Indiana. I really hope that doesn't happen.
And all this is just Indiana!! Further west, they're getting tornadoes and hail. Out in Colorado last week, on storm system brought them heavy rains, hail that covered the ground with nearly 6 inches of ice, and even snow! Meanwhile, down south they have a severe drought happening. They desperately need this rain we need no more of!! Lake Okeechobee is so low and the weather is so dry that there's been wildfires burning the dry lake bed areas!! A few weeks ago, the dry weather prompted quick spreading of fires in my hometown of Palm Bay, FL, ultimately burning over 11,000 acres and damaging or destroying over 160 homes!! Sadly, that was started by an arsonist, but if it wasn't so dry, it wouldn't have spread the way it did. Then you have the wildfires on the west coast, that will ultimately lead to more mudslides when the wet season come there. And this is just the tip of what's going on in the world... *sigh*
I see all this in the media, and think the world is truly seeing rough times. Is it global warming? Is it just a freak time for us? Or is the media coverage that much more abundant that it's making it seem worse? Whatever it is, I think it should be a wake up call for everyone. As if the gas crisis we're in doesn't make things seem bad enough, this seals the deal on needing to pay attention to what we're doing to the environment and really re-evaluate what we really need from the earth and take better care of it. I think if we take better care of it, it will take better care of us. Something to think about.
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