A new addition

Late last week, Lucy and I tempted fate too many times and finally lost. We occasionally eat at a local pizza joint then visit the pet store that neighbors it. On this particular visit, one pup, a pie-bald Dachshund, was aggravating the crap out of his cell-mate. He played, growled and after seeing us watching, wanted to get after us! Now this is a big 'no no', but we took him out and played with him in a little room. Welp....after watching him bite my shoes and run circles around the room, we couldn't bare to put him back into his cage.

Meet Dudley, the new addition to the Crosby family.

Tornado! 2008 edition

I lived in middle Georgia for over 20 years and NEVER remember a tornado coming near my home. Maybe we were just lucky for all that time, but in consecutive years, my parents have narrowly missed their path.

As posted last year (look in my March 2007 posts), a tornado came within a few hundreds yards of their house. It followed the road my parents live on, but turned into the woods in another direction as it closed in. No one was killed, but numerous houses were destroyed.

Two weeks ago, Lucy and I visited her mother in Dublin, GA (about 20 minutes from my parent's home) for Father's Day. We went to sleep Saturday night no expecting anything more than a storm, but around 6:00am, I was awakening by a screeching siren. I listened for a minute then asked Lucy w/ a sleepy slur, "Why are all those fire trucks driving by?" "That is a tornado siren, dummy!" Hehehehe.

I then could hear the wind whipping in the pine trees outside and the rain pounding the window. It passed within a hour, but the news that trickled in wasn't good. Macon, about an hour away, was pounded mightily, but news that hit even closer to home, was 2 people were killed about 10 minutes away - about halfway between my parent's home and Dublin.

The phone lines were out so info was scarce, but luckily my parents were out of town so their safety wasn't in question. The condition of their house was another matter though so I made my way there. The major road, 441, was closed to I took the back way going by Evergreen Rd, the area the two people were killed when their house was thrown against a tree. Pine trees, telephone/power lines and debree were scattered everywhere. Trees that were 10ft + wide were torn out of the ground like they were sticks. Luckily, I didn't see 'much' damage to homes, but I didn't venture toward the worst area. I HATE accident gawkers so I continued my drive toward my parents home.

As in 2007, they avoided any damage. A few pine trees were broken, but honestly, you could barely tell a storm passed. I don't know what they're doing to avoid the tornadoes, but keep it up! Not only did they missed the GA tornado, but the city they were visiting, Greensboro, N.C., had a tornado hit near the hotel they stayed the night before!

Here's to hoping that I don't have to write a 'Tornado: 2009 edition!"