ARIZONA TO ALASKA 

Hope everyone had a great Leap Day.

Big blog entry, Joe. Will have to read in more detail later... thank you for continuing the blog.
My thoughts go out to the family, troublemaker or not.

So what’s getting into everyone there then? Are they all going a bit stir crazy with the weather being as it is? As it has been for the last 10 weeks – iced in to the max?

Quiet little Dutch has had a spate of violence that would seem to justify locking up every 20 something man and throwing away the key.

Last Friday the hugely inappropriately named ANGEL and his twin brother Antonio got very drunk and Angel fell down outside the infamous Harbor View Bar. A female bar worker, apparently well used to dealing with such an occurrence (I’ll bet she is…) gave the little Angel a hand to get to his feet – whereupon he decided to put her in a chokehold to the point she could not breathe. Bystanders stepped in and pulled Angel off only for his equally lovely twin bro to lay in to the poor woman and hit her in the face.

Their folks must be so proud.

Then on Monday night a chap in the same venue, having perceived himself threatened by the much bigger chaps in the bar, decided - having been asked to leave said venue, that the best idea would be for him to go fetch his gun. He was heard threatening to ‘kill everyone he could find’ when he unwisely returned to the bar seeking revenge, so he got disarmed by bystanders.

It occurs that being a bystander warrants some kind of danger money in Dutch.

The guys that disarmed the chap with the gun were themselves (briefly) arrested whilst the passing police officer who witnessed the fracas figured out the innocent from the guilty as hell.

I’d imagine that can take some doing when everyone has had a skin full.

Altercations a go-go.

Scary to think how easily one life can be taken and others changed for ever though isn’t it?



GNU GUY must be thinking just that, as he lays awake at night listening to traffic pass by.

He either needs the protection of a row of steel bollards or a big row of innocent bystanders.

Whichever is cheapest.

Beautiful shots of the snow Joe! And those little foxes too! Got some things to view from you! This weekend Ihope!

The snow looks overwhelming. And someone being beaten to death? What next?

UL got beaten by South Florida last night. Sad. It was Senior's night and the after-game program was canceled. UK plays tonight. I don't think they can be beaten. Next week starts Big East tourney. Should be interesting.

Spring is coming. Another day in the high 60s. Storms tomorrow. Tornado south of us yesterday. Pansies are blooming. If basketball is almost over and pansies and daffodils are blooming - it must be near spring. Things are looking up.

Speaking of rare weather events, Wunderground has this for you next week Joe:

Friday Night
Overcast with a chance of a thunderstorm. Low of 27F with a windchill as low as 19F. Winds from the WNW at 15-20 mph. Chance of rain 20%.

I researched just how rare this is for your area, knowing that you have never experienced a thunderstorm there yet. I found this:

Where can you go to avoid thunderstorms?
Many people really enjoy thunderstorms, and some don’t. For the latter, may we suggest St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea off Alaska. On 8 November 1992, they reported a thunderstorm - the first one in 40 years!
http://www.sky-fire.tv/index.cgi/thunderstorms.ht ml#recordlows

Thunderstorms make the air suddenly feel much cooler, I wonder if anyone would notice given THAT windchill?

We are out of the basement. We have been blessed. Tornados 20 miles north and south of us. Unreal devastation. Apparently 5 people have died that they know about as yet. They are saying it was 1/2 mile wide and on the ground for 25 miles and that is just in our viewing area. My heart goes out to those folks who were in its path. Mother Nature is a force that can't be reckoned with. She will have her way.

Ylee: Were you affected by this?

Ylee's back at work and has checked in. He says "stories to follow" but seems all is ok. Glad you're ok, too, dotmom. Bad scene, for sure.

We have had quiet weather in my north-western part of Iowa today. Windy,and mostly cloudy but no precipitation at all. The south and east parts of the state got blasted with a whole lot of snow.
I am glad we were spared the high winds and tornadoes. This weather pattern must be getting old for all you folks to the south. My heart goes out to those who lost life and homes and businesses. DotMom is right... you don't mess with mother nature, you take what you get whether it seems fair or not.
I am glad all the Joebloggers seem to be safe so far!

Sunny California! We had a modest little storm come through on the 29th, lapping over for a few hundredths on the 1st. A total of 0.26" of rain. It was a cold storm and brought daytime temperatures into the upper 50s with high 30s overnight. The storm did a lot more in the Sierras which is really where we need the water. Down in the foothills and here on the coast, streams and reservoirs are pretty low. But, they are actually letting water out of a lot of the dams to keep enough water in the streams that run to the ocean flowing enough for any salmon that might wish to migrate.

After hearing from all of you back in the east and south, I would be ashamed to complain. We are really lucky. However, there is no rain in the 10-day forecast. Actually supposed to get up to 79 this weekend!

Really interesting batch of photos, Joe. I think you have a lot of really hungry foxes right now. Hope you don't run short of chow. Even if they aren't a native species, they are so beautiful that I think they deserve to live. They are really very polite fellows, better than a couple of our cats.

Very bad about that murder. I'm surprised that it doesn't happen more often considering the conditions. Too much alcohol in circulation, not enough daylight and not enough of a lot of other civilizing influences.

Be safe everyone!

Dotmom, I'm glad you and JoeKy are safe! It was a little hairy around here, but thankfully no one was injured, as far as I know!

Dotmom I too want to say how thankful I was to learn Louisville was not on the list to be hit by the tornadoes yesterday. We kept in touch with our son several times during the day. He kept saying the sirens have not gone off yet. You are so lucky to have your basement. What a good feeling when these horrible storms approach that you have a safe place to go. Enjoy your quiet weekend.

What a difference a day makes. Twenty-six or so have died from the tornado. Looking at this devastation is overwhelming. Can't imagine dealing with it. They were comparing it to the 1974 tornado that came through here. It too was a killer with about 18 people in Brandenburg (south of us) losing their lives. We have such an efficient warning system now. The local TV stations take over for hours and can plot its path to the minutes. Some people get frustrated that they are missing the "Young and the Restless" but it definitely saves lives. I signed up for the auto warning system whereby the National Weather Service gives you an automated call when you should go to your safe place. It was right on time yesterday.

Yesterday, we had a feeling it was going to be rough around here when Jim Cantore, meterologist for the National Weather station was in town. He was right, sad to say.

It is bright and sunny here this morning - a good way to start the day to bring some hope to those facing the worst of it.

The tornadoes have been the main news headline here all morning – the pictures are amazing and terrifying in equal measure. Really glad you have a basement in which to hide and good warning systems in place Dotmom. The shock of what MIGHT BE left to emerge into after a tornado pays a visit would be enough to keep me in hiding FOR GOOD. I can’t even begin to imagine how painfully disorientating and bewildering that must feel, and so many went through that experience in the last 24 hours.

The ‘lucky’ ones lived to tell the tale.

Scenes showing your big yellow school buses thrown around and trashed by storms always have that extra surreal feeling. They so often feature in disaster movies that when you see one thrown into the side of a building it’s hard for the brain to deal with it as a reality. Seeing the school building in Henryville so heavily damaged brings it home, and a high security jail took a hit? Nightmare scenarios.

Are the warning systems and tornado prediction services accurate enough to almost always give enough time to close schools and businesses early? To allow people time to head home, fetch their kids, reach a place of safety?

What would happen if they had a big sports event on? I’m thinking of that huge KFC arena that Joe visited (with the death defying seating in the GODS) – do they cancel games at very late notice when the weather people predict trubba? Or do they have an underground place of safety designed to shelter thousands? What about shopping malls? Airports?

When you see the devastation of half mile wide tornadoes in largely rural neighbourhoods you wonder just what that level of damage would look like in a city landscape.

Has it ever happened?




Incidentally, that lack of ‘other civilizing influences’ in Dutch Harbor which Haupty makes reference to?

218 males to every 100 females.

And that concludes the case for the prosecution…

We are doing pretty well today - but I hate to bother you all, but has anyone seen JoeKY's wallet? The last he had it was when we went to the basement yesterday to escape any tornado coming our way. He doesn't carry it on his person all the time - but at times, he wants it there (not because he has a huge wad of $$$) but because he has a copy of his many meds he takes and if something should happen and he ended up in a hospital - he would have this vital info for the medical people and the schedule would go on - uninterrupted. He is an engineer you know.

We have looked high and low and to no avail. The only thing I have found is more dust! We will keep looking and also when FranKY gets home from work - before we say hello - we'll ask her if she has seen it. I think it must have blown away with the storm. Keep an eye out for it!

It will turn up when you least expect to find it. Could it have fallen out of his hand when he was putting it into his pocket and gotten under a piece of furniture. Maybe it fell into the cushions on the couch. I will send hunting and finding prayers up your way. Good luck.

Dotmom, I sympathize with the aggravation. I was in a rush to get out the door for a medical procedure a couple of months back. With a fresh change of cloths on, I decided that some of my usual pocket clutter was not necessary and could go back to my regular cloths which were hanging on the back of a chair. I dug out my expensive Kershaw pocket knife which I'd had for probably 10 years and dropped it into the old pants' pocket. I heard a soft thud which didn't fully register with me at the time.

Several hours later I changed back into my comfortably shabby, usual attire and discovered that there was no pocket knife. I remembered that thud and immediately searched all the floor area under and around the chair where I'd hung those pants. The knife hasn't been seen since! Following Ogal's philosophy, I soon bought a cheaper replacement; I can't stand being without a pocket knife. I hoped that this minor act of defiance to the "God of the Lost" would make the Kershaw suddenly pop out of its hiding place. NO!

My next plan is to go buy an expensive pocket knife, more expensive, certainly, than the original. Then, I am sure the old one will pop up behind my left ear the next morning. And if not, I won't care because I have a better one now (until I lose it).

But the thing is this: I know that that knife never left this house. It will be found; but maybe not in this life.

My advise though is this. Anytime I lose something, or realize that I have, I immediately sit down and write up a list of everyplace that I have been since I positively remember having it (all the places I can remember, that is). I can assure you that I haven't seen it in California.

So if JoeKY's wallet has indeed gone off to Oz, just be glad that JoeKY didn't go with it.

I hope the wallet turns up soon, Dotmom. That is when I always lose things, that is, when I'm doing something out of routine with some object that is also not in a routine. I usually find it fallen underneath something else, hidden. Usually it has gone through more than one fall, that is, maybe fallen out of a pocket, but whatever it falls on also drops it maybe.

UK had me in stitches in her posts, as usual. :) I imagine we all have tornado stories. I was working in a downtown Houston high-rise office once when a tornado struck another high-rise a couple of blocks away. We didn't have any warning, and as far as I know, there wasn't any plan. UK, funny thing about tornadoes is that when you are right up in one, or very close, you can't see them, but you can hear and feel them. So, when the windows started sucking in and out on the floors with windows, the people hit the inside stair wells and ran to one of the floors with no windows (it was the company cafeteria on the 4th floor, so everybody knew it was there). It seems to be safe in such a place. People were pretty shaken up, but nobody was hurt. Even in the building that got hit, some people were cut by broken glass, but nobody was seriously hurt. It seems the office tower won against the tornado. There was a big stripe of broken windows all up and down it where the tornado hit, but otherwise not much damage. I'm not sure if they were lucky it just hit a glancing blow or if it actually kind of bounced off the building. My guess would be a glancing blow. I don't know if a tornado could tear down an office tower, but I bet it could do more damage than broken windows if it hit it square on.

When I was growing up, the schools did have tornado plans of sorts. Basically--run into the interior hallways away from any windows and try to get underneath something solid (at least try to cover your head). But, no, a tornado would never leave time to evacuate. I have never seen school kids sent home during warnings. If they stayed home every day there were tornadic storms around, it would be way too many days. And when they had a very high probability warning, by the time they got all the school buses and drivers together--it would be over. I have memories of us all sitting there in school, anxiously keeping one eye on the clouds out the windows, trying to concentrate, on those days.

It's a miracle! Wallet has been found! It is wierd, but JoeKy had been sitting in his usual chair - got up to go into the bedroom for a few minutes and when he did, he pushed the chair back a bit. But he went on and when he came out - it was unbelievable, but right in front of the chair was the wallet. He accused us of "planting" it there. He had said - if he didn't find the wallet, we wouldn't be going out for breakfast tomorrow morning. Honestly, we were as shocked as he was. It must have been stuck in the cushion some how and when he moved the chair, it fell out. We first saw it as he did.

Dave, that is something about your favorite knife. How could it go any place. Keep looking, it will turn up sooner or later.

Thanks to those who expressed concern for us yesterday and then the wallet today. This is unbelievable but... There was a little two-year girl (Indiana, I think) that was picked up in the tornado vortex and carried 10 miles and found in a field. She is in the Children's hospital in critical condition. Her parents,brother and sister were ALL killed. How bad can it get.

I might be wrong about the two-year old being carried 10 miles by the vortex. The news reporter said that tonight on the local news - but I "googled" it and it says she was found among her dead family. Any way pretty traumatic either way.

UK...not too many years ago downtown Salt Lake City, Utah was hit by a freak tornado (they don't get many tornados in that part of the country)...all of it caught on video of course. There was a convention setting up...a real mess as I remember.

Since we were talking about it, I see that 2yo that survived her family (in the recent tornadoes in Indiana) must have been badly injured, because she also died. Surviving extended family have lost an entire family. That is so sad.

My heart goes out to all who lost friends and family in this disaster. This was sent to me this morning:
http://www.gohorseshow.com/article/Columns/Sudden _Scoop/McCardle_Family_of_Kentucky_Devastated_by_T ornados/37222

Sad how these storms are tearing up our country year after year.
Here's an interesting article on the tornadoes: http://rss2.earthsky.org/~r/fullsite/~3/dWxf3bCOE oM/recap-of-deadly-u-s-tornado-outbreak-february-2 8-march-3-2012. EF3 confirmed about 50-80 miles north of my location.

It's good to hear that Dotmom and all are safe and the runaway wallet was found. A bright spot in all this heartbreaking time.

We had two to three inches of snow overnight. It is a winter wonderland outside by us. Of course this will make the cleanup so much harder for those working on the aftermath of the tornado. We can't stop talking about it.

Long time in posting on Joe's blog but glad to see Dotmom and JoeKy and other JoeA bloggers are okay. I was thinking about you all being in the storm tracks. My aunt lives in Lebanon, TN and I had just emailed her about the severe storms headed her way when she started hearing the alarms and the dog going barking mad. Fortunately, all is well with her and my cousin's family. Feels like deja vu from last year's storms that wreaked havoc across our central midwest.

Joe
Sounds like it's time to ban Yukon Jack sales in Dutch. Do you handle the booz sales to the ships?