Lights Out!

Around 4:40 I took the pups out for a walk. Loki wanted nothing to do with the outside and kept making a beeline for the house. That's when I finally noticed that there were dark clouds to the west and the first rumblings of thunder. I took the dogs inside and checked the weather. Hail in 11 minutes! I ran outside to put the ducklings away since it was their first full day outside and they likely wouldn't be able to figure out the ramp ... Getting outside and there was this sudden downburst. Our huge pines behind the chicken coop were all being pushed to the north, violently. And then it started to downpour. It was as if I had jumped in a lake. All my adult birds were hunkering down under bushes and buildings. The ducklings ... not so much. As I am trying to herd the ducklings into the coop I hear all this cracking behind me. I hurriedly get the last duckling inside and then run inside myself, absolutely drenched. Just before I get in, there is a boom of lightning very close to me. I come to find out later that a tree fell not too far behind me when I was putting away the ducklings and the boom of lightning was my neighbor's driveway getting struck ...

We lost power not too soon after. There were trees down everywhere. Mr. Badger and I heard a chainsaw in front of our house. Mr. Badger ran out to see what was going on and a large pine had fallen over the road from across the street and no one could get by. Two of our neighbors were already trying to clean it up. Mr. Badger grabbed our beefy stihl and got to work on it as well.

Pictured is Mr. Badger later on that evening keeping cool at the bottom of our basement stairs reading a book, hah! We didn't get power back until 10:45 the next morning. Whew!