Saturday, November 13, 2010

The Carnage

We had our first Winter storm of the season on Friday.  It was beautiful and 65 on Thursday then the storm blew in around 8pm and things got ugly.  It started with a down pour of rain that lasted for hours...we received about 2.5 inches of rain - it thundered all night long.  The rain turned into snow around 4am and it continued to thunder-snow for several more hours - which is a unique thing to experience.   Our weather man told us we would only receive a "trace" amount of snow....that trace ended up being between 5 & 6 inches.  Randy has a theory about the weather men in Amarillo...and I think he's on to something.  Most of the time when they predict "trace amounts" we get 5 or more inches of snow and when they predict "5 or more inches of snow" we only get a trace amount.  Go figure.... 

I always thought Odessa had strange & changing weather but Amarillo takes the top prize.  I have seen it hail without rain and thunder with snow.  I have seen wind (from out of nowhere) take the roofs off of homes and storms coming from miles away.  I have sat in the middle of the yard with neighbors and watched tornados literally dance around the sky and then threw everything out of closet for a place to hide.  The people around these parts have the right to say "if you don't like the weather wait a few minutes it will change!"

The snow was really beautiful yesterday but there was lots of carnage...tree carnage that is.  Randy and I really love trees...on our little spread we have 19 huge trees that are least 30 years old.  We always fertilize, prune, and pray constantly every year for the safety of our trees.  In the spring time it's the wind storms, the summer time it's the thunderstorms, the fall it's the wind again, and winter time it's the ice & snow....of course it always seems like tornado season around here. 

We were blessed not to have much damage from yesterday's storm....we lost about four branches but nothing like our neighbors or others around Amarillo.  This truly makes Randy and I very sad....most of these trees are 30 years or older and it takes less than 30 minutes to destroy.DSC00745044049068059052061054056           The last 2 pictures are from Randy's first childhood home.  He said that his Mother planted this pecan tree before he was born. 

By the way....it is going to be warm and in the fifties today.

2 comments:

Linda said...

We too drove around yesterday so I could take photos of the devastation. I thought I might post my photos today if I have time. We too were sad. Did you see the photo on the front page of the paper, a tree was split right down the middle.

Devora Chana said...

How sad that the tree Mrs. Hare planted so many years ago was damaged (destroyed?). That must have made him very sad to see it.

I love the older trees that provide so much beauty and shade.