TIMBERRRRRRRRR!

Last night at around 4 AM CST, we were awaken by some loud thunder. Just as we opened our eyes, we were treated to the greatest light show ever. Unfortunately, it was staged in our very own backyard. One of our largest trees, which stood at least 20 feet tall, was buzzed by a powerful lightning bolt. As it toppled over, it ripped the power line off of our house and sent sparks shooting into the night sky. It was pretty intense to say the least. While it looks like we'll have to add some tree chopping and some roofing work to this weekend's activities, we were relieved that the house did not catch fire. Unfortunately, we just went to the grocery store and bought 3 weeks of food and with the backlog of electrical repairs that the city of Dallas is having to work through, it appears as though we will be shopping again soon.


As you can see, this was 20 or so degrees to the right of being a lot worse.


Apparently, lightning will fry you from the inside out.


The power cable. The whole right side of the tree lost its leaves immediately.

We're thinking about carving out a bat a la "The Natural" for Fayte and her little brother:


Or perhaps we can fashion the wood into one of these bad boys:


By the way, do you like the category we've filed this post into?

UPDATE (4/12): Blogging remotely as the Le Unit has become a nomadic clan, traveling to where we can siphon power to charge our electronics for the night. It's been difficult, but Fayte's been a trooper through all of this.

The storm cleanup continues. It's day 4 and we're still without power. After giving us the cold shoulder until now, the electric company came out only to tell us they can't do anything until we pay for the damage to the electric box! A tree falls down and severs their cable and we have to pay for it. Would've been nice for them to at least tell us that 4 days ago so we could begin repairs!

So we had an emergency electrician come out and say he can't do anything until we fix the brick and the roof damage. Looks like it'll be at least another week without power. Oh and to make our amish lifestyle even more fun, we found another fallen tree on the side of our house. This one's leaning on our neighbor's roof:


Mother nature is no cheap date.