One step forward, two steps back

I guess I should say that in the grand scheme of things, we were very, very lucky. Adam and I took a walk around the neighborhood the other day and looked at all the pretty houses. One of these beautiful red brick bungalows was destroyed by not one, but TWO trees falling on the house, while there were 6 children inside-- and no one was hurt. I'd say things could be worse. As my dad's friend always said, "You could be on fire."

I knew that we were supposed to get rain, but I didn't think much of it and I thought it was coming in late. So I stayed in Fayetteville to have dinner with some girlfriends. Adam called and said that I might want to stay there while the storm passed because it was really something else-- in fact, he and the cat were hanging out in the interior hallway in case of a tornado.

Now, Adam's not a worrier, or a Chicken Little. But growing up, we had tornado warnings 4 times a week this time of year. You become a little oblivious, and I just chalked it up to Adam having not lived in those conditions. But he insisted that I call and check on my mom, just in case.

My sister answered the phone and sounded like she was having a stroke-- because these had just started coming down:


You got it. Golfball-sized hail. Adam saved these in the freezer. What a guy, huh? No, seriously! I was excited to see them!

Anyway, it started dripping then gushing out of the AC vents and light fixtures in the living room and the kiddo's room and he had started sounding so worn out and miserable. So I drove down during a "lull" in the storm-- a lull I wouldn't drive in under any other circumstances. On the way, they started reporting impassable flooding on ALL of the surrounding main streets of my house. I had to drive about 30 minutes out of the way, and turn around in driveways and take the most back asswards route possible. But I got there.

I did the next round of bucket changing and floor mopping. Imagine this with about 5 more buckets:


Then I got about an hour and a half of sleep before we heard something fall. Thinking the light fixtures had filled with water and dropped, we got up to check things out and found that...


Four square feet of ceiling had fallen! and now that there's SO MUCH SPACE for water to exit, the buckets, which all had holes by the way, weren't enough. We couldn't dry towels fast enough. And after all the work on the floors, we are damned if this water is gonna ruin them.

Anyway, I didn't really sleep last night. In addition to the ceiling, the kiddo's room will need its ceiling replaced. Adam saw some straight up HOLES in the roof from the hail so it will likely need replacing; it knocked out both garage windows and one car windshield was cracked. In fact, it removed one light of a casement window and set it unharmed about 5 feet away. weird. Knocked paint off the garage. Both couches are soak, soak, soaked. It's a busy time at work, and I hate being gone, but I really don't want to leave this until I've talked to the insurance girl-- and of course her line is busy...

The flooding's gone down, the rain has stopped, and I'm allowed to get some sleep now, but I can't. Guess I'll commit to a few cups of coffee.

Here's some pics of the damage:








Not damage, per se, but a whole frikin lot of leaves to rake. That's all leaves you see there. I so thought I was done with those.