Sister's Choice Quilts

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What’s With the Weather?

Flood istockphoto

Something is seriously wrong with the weather lately.  I don't know if it is due to global warning, as we are hearing so much about, or some other freakish reason.  The folks in Iowa are all under water from the sound of things….Maria (Shallow Thoughts From Iowa), are you there?  It is truly tragic, what a mess there is going on there.  I saw a photo in the morning paper of a bridge on the Cedar River, and at least 18 homes that had floated off their foundations had jammed up against it.  How is that ever going to get cleaned up?  Unbelievable.

On Friday when I was happily occupied with my sewing, it suddenly went all dark outside.  Huh?  The sun had been shining and there hadn't been a cloud in sight a minute ago.  Was it raining?  It doesn't do that here in California in June.  I went outside to see what was going on, and there was a weird reddish glow all around.  I looked up at the sky and this is what I saw:

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That red sky is from a huge fire that was burning south of us.  The Indian Fire in the Los Padres wilderness.  The sun was blotted out from the smoke.

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Our fire season doesn't usually begin until August or September, so with things starting up this early, I bet we are really in for it.

Now, I am going to share with you a truly hair raising email from my sister Mary in Wisconsin.  She is such a good writer, and I don't think she would mind me posting her description of her recent experience during a tornado warning.

Tornado istockphoto

"Speaking of bad weather, we have been having the worst weather I have ever seen in my life. We have been stuck in these ongoing stationary fronts, where raging thunderstorms full of tornadoes pass over our house for hours and days on end. The storm front moves sideways so the same areas are pummeled for hours. Most of Wisconsin is seriously flooded – I am so glad we live on a hill. That does not protect us from lightning, however. Or tornadoes.

Last night, we had to huddle in the basement for hours, scared out of our wits. A tornado was passing through our area. My "our area" I mean right over our HOUSE. Eddy the cat was downstairs huddling with us in terror. He kept trying to squeeze in behind me on the couch.  I had to put a pillow over him for him to calm down. I have never seen him so freaked out before. It's like he just KNEW something bad was happening. It wasn't even raining very hard or thundering, but he kept looking at the ceiling — as though he was looking right through it at something horrifying up above. The barometric pressure was changing rapidly. Our ears were popping.

We hadn't lost power, yet, so we were watching the alerts on TV with the weather radar on screen with all these big orange and red and purple radar blobs passing over where we live (green is light rain, yellow is stronger, and so forth)– and the weatherman was saying stuff like "We just had a report of a funnel cloud touching the ground near Oregon [the next town over], okay? I don't mean to sound alarmist, but, this is bad, folks. This is really bad. This is as bad as I have ever seen it in my 28 year career. We have reports of softball sized hail falling in Sun Prairie and Stoughton. Oh, this is bad. In fact…" — and then he abruptly left the screen, presumably to run down the the stations' basement to take cover.  We were just watching the silent radar, bug eyed, realizing that our whole house could be sucked up into the sky at any second. We clutched each other like it could be our last moments alive.

Obviously, it didn't suck our house into the air, all is well, no damage to us  – or our trees – (although I had nightmares all during what little sleep I got), and today is a lovely sunny day as though nothing ever happened… except all the farmers' corn fields are now lakes.

And you might have seen on the news a couple nights ago, a big lake (Lake Delton) up by the Dells (about 45 minutes away) emptied like a bathtub into the Wisconsin river. Three of our Home Health United offices are literally under water. My own office is wet from minor flooding and a leak in the roof. The damage in our state alone will be in the tens, perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars… and that's NOTHING compared to what has happened to Iowa.  Cedar City and Des Moines look like New Orleans now.

Sigh… enough about that. This is global warming. It is here."

36 responses to “What’s With the Weather?”

  3. What a scary story from your sister (I live in tornado country, and that story scares even me), and what a scary photo of your sky. Do you think it’s time to make us some of those signs that say “The End Is Near”?

  4. What a scary story from your sister (I live in tornado country, and that story scares even me), and what a scary photo of your sky. Do you think it’s time to make us some of those signs that say “The End Is Near”?

  5. It’s just awful, isn’t it? Too bad we can’t send some of the Midwest’s excess water to the Colorado River system and the West Coast. You could really use it.

  6. It’s just awful, isn’t it? Too bad we can’t send some of the Midwest’s excess water to the Colorado River system and the West Coast. You could really use it.

  7. I am from Iowa originally and my family still lives in the areas that are being pelted with rain and floods…and it is heartbreaking to see the towns that are dealing with this…not only Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Cedar Falls, Iowa City, etc., but countless small towns, some of which aren’t going to recover. My sister lives in CR and left her house Thursday morning for work as the water was more than six blocks from her home and there were “no threats”…two hours later it was all flooded, she could not get back to her home. The canoe rescue units had to go back “in” and save her two little dogs, which they did. She cannot even get a boat tour of her area until sometime Tuesday to see what the damages might be…she had a lovely home in a historical neighborhood…and hers is not an isolated story…my question is what on earth does one do with that much water and mud???? One heck of a clean up bill…

  8. I am from Iowa originally and my family still lives in the areas that are being pelted with rain and floods…and it is heartbreaking to see the towns that are dealing with this…not only Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Cedar Falls, Iowa City, etc., but countless small towns, some of which aren’t going to recover. My sister lives in CR and left her house Thursday morning for work as the water was more than six blocks from her home and there were “no threats”…two hours later it was all flooded, she could not get back to her home. The canoe rescue units had to go back “in” and save her two little dogs, which they did. She cannot even get a boat tour of her area until sometime Tuesday to see what the damages might be…she had a lovely home in a historical neighborhood…and hers is not an isolated story…my question is what on earth does one do with that much water and mud???? One heck of a clean up bill…

  9. No global warming, just normal fluctuations in weather, probably exaggerated due to low sunspot activity.
    Nicole, any chance you can fix your blog so it renders normally in Firefox web browser? I have the devil of a time getting to your comments!

  10. No global warming, just normal fluctuations in weather, probably exaggerated due to low sunspot activity.
    Nicole, any chance you can fix your blog so it renders normally in Firefox web browser? I have the devil of a time getting to your comments!

  11. What a scary story. I have been listening to all the scary weather. We are really living in some scary times. Economically as well as weatherwise.

  12. What a scary story. I have been listening to all the scary weather. We are really living in some scary times. Economically as well as weatherwise.

  13. Southern Ontario, Canada has been having some strange weather the last couple of weeks as well. Last Sunday we had a tornado warning. A tornado warning in Toronto?? That is unheard of. Over the past decade or so I have seen huge changes in weather patterns here and do believe that climate change is well and truly a fact we all have to come to grips with and learn what we can do to try to stop it from getting worse.

  14. Southern Ontario, Canada has been having some strange weather the last couple of weeks as well. Last Sunday we had a tornado warning. A tornado warning in Toronto?? That is unheard of. Over the past decade or so I have seen huge changes in weather patterns here and do believe that climate change is well and truly a fact we all have to come to grips with and learn what we can do to try to stop it from getting worse.

  15. I live in Cedar Rapids, though not in the flooded area. They say that more than 1300 blocks have been flooded by the Cedar River and 25,000 people have been evacuated. The water supply was down to one well – 25% yesterday but thanks to the cooperation of everyone, it’s back up to 50%. The entire downtown business district had flood water up to the first floors and some of the buildings may be structurally unsound. The Cedar Rapids library is a total loss as is the Czech Museum and so many other buildings. Mays Island, which holds our county courthouse and the jail, was completely submerged. The river was 31 feet high and flood stage is 12 feet. The police department and main fire station were also lost. There are 20 houseboats that floated away from their moorings at Ellis Park that are now pushing against the railroad bridge by Quaker Oats. The water itself isn’t simply mud. It contains every possible contaminate from feces to garbage to pesticides to chemicals to micro organisms such as e coli to who knows what! Iowa City is getting hit hard too. The University of Iowa has at least 15 buildings flooded from the Iowa River, including Hancher Auditorium, which has water up to the stage.
    Interstate 80 is closed east of Iowa City causing a detour of over 200 miles for people traveling across country.
    The small town of Columbus Junction, Iowa, is going to get the full brunt of both rivers sometime next week.
    The news people are comparing it to Hurricane Katrina. We were in the same weather pattern as Mary and better weather is ahead. Please keep us in your thoughts.
    Karen

  16. I live in Cedar Rapids, though not in the flooded area. They say that more than 1300 blocks have been flooded by the Cedar River and 25,000 people have been evacuated. The water supply was down to one well – 25% yesterday but thanks to the cooperation of everyone, it’s back up to 50%. The entire downtown business district had flood water up to the first floors and some of the buildings may be structurally unsound. The Cedar Rapids library is a total loss as is the Czech Museum and so many other buildings. Mays Island, which holds our county courthouse and the jail, was completely submerged. The river was 31 feet high and flood stage is 12 feet. The police department and main fire station were also lost. There are 20 houseboats that floated away from their moorings at Ellis Park that are now pushing against the railroad bridge by Quaker Oats. The water itself isn’t simply mud. It contains every possible contaminate from feces to garbage to pesticides to chemicals to micro organisms such as e coli to who knows what! Iowa City is getting hit hard too. The University of Iowa has at least 15 buildings flooded from the Iowa River, including Hancher Auditorium, which has water up to the stage.
    Interstate 80 is closed east of Iowa City causing a detour of over 200 miles for people traveling across country.
    The small town of Columbus Junction, Iowa, is going to get the full brunt of both rivers sometime next week.
    The news people are comparing it to Hurricane Katrina. We were in the same weather pattern as Mary and better weather is ahead. Please keep us in your thoughts.
    Karen

  17. Words just can’t express how we all feel. So many people – families – in harms way. We saw the smoke from the fire Wednesday when we drove to Monterey. I mentioned in my blog about homes in Stockton burning. None of us are exempt from tragedy. We need to keep everyone in our prayers. I was raised in the midwest and tornadoes are SCARY!!!

  18. Words just can’t express how we all feel. So many people – families – in harms way. We saw the smoke from the fire Wednesday when we drove to Monterey. I mentioned in my blog about homes in Stockton burning. None of us are exempt from tragedy. We need to keep everyone in our prayers. I was raised in the midwest and tornadoes are SCARY!!!

  19. We have friends who have lost about everything in the flood in Cedar Rapids. We have had some wild weather here too. Tornado took the roof off the building my brother works in at K State. No one seems to be immune!

  20. We have friends who have lost about everything in the flood in Cedar Rapids. We have had some wild weather here too. Tornado took the roof off the building my brother works in at K State. No one seems to be immune!

  23. Those pictures of the red sky are something else. I hope you and your family stay safe during all this strange weather…you just have to think it’s got to settle down soon. Seems like it’s been going on for ages, with the el nino’s and el nina’s.
    Take care,

  24. Those pictures of the red sky are something else. I hope you and your family stay safe during all this strange weather…you just have to think it’s got to settle down soon. Seems like it’s been going on for ages, with the el nino’s and el nina’s.
    Take care,

  25. I totally relate to your sister’s story. I live in Wisconsin and spent part of the stormy week in the basement with my family also. Couldn’t believe, funnel cloud after funnel cloud, torrential rain. We were VERY lucky. My heart goes out to the flood victims.

  26. I totally relate to your sister’s story. I live in Wisconsin and spent part of the stormy week in the basement with my family also. Couldn’t believe, funnel cloud after funnel cloud, torrential rain. We were VERY lucky. My heart goes out to the flood victims.

  29. As much as I hate winter I am glad I live in NH because we don’t get tornadoes, or earthquakes or too much flooding, or many fires. Just the occasional hurricane that has weakened by the time it gets here. At least with snow you get a snow day off from work.

  30. As much as I hate winter I am glad I live in NH because we don’t get tornadoes, or earthquakes or too much flooding, or many fires. Just the occasional hurricane that has weakened by the time it gets here. At least with snow you get a snow day off from work.

  31. The weather seems to have gone crazy everywhere. While here at my place we are enjoying the change . . . sunny days in June are almost unheard of, I sure do fret over the troubles so many others are having elsewhere.

  32. The weather seems to have gone crazy everywhere. While here at my place we are enjoying the change . . . sunny days in June are almost unheard of, I sure do fret over the troubles so many others are having elsewhere.

  35. Your sister’s story of her experience scared the pants off of me! I’m glad everyone is okay.
    The photos of the orange sky are amazing, as are the other photos. I guess all we can do is count our blessings, right?

  36. Your sister’s story of her experience scared the pants off of me! I’m glad everyone is okay.
    The photos of the orange sky are amazing, as are the other photos. I guess all we can do is count our blessings, right?