Category: weather

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Our First Snow is Here!

Most of the country seemed to enjoy a white Christmas, but we only had rain here in Nashville. It was cold and windy and dark, but most people were focused on being inside exchanging gifts and feasting on traditional Christmas dinner foods. Some guys were all about watching football and there were some great children’s movies on cable to keep the kids occupied.

But when I woke up this morning, there were huge snow flakes swirling around in the air. It is just about 32 degrees outside, so I wonder if any of it will stick to the ground and give us a snow day today? We don’t get very much snow here anyway, so when it snows around Christmas that makes it special – even if it is the day after.

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Too Hot to Go Outside

Wouldn’t you know it? We are having one of the hottest summers on record with a bad drought and today my car’s air conditioner quit working. I had just finished grocery shopping at Kroger and loaded all the groceries into the back seat and as I drove out of the parking lot a funny smell started coming out of the air vents in my car. I turned off the radio and heard a funny squealing noise, too. The smell was awful and I could actually see it pouring out of the vents like smoke, but it didn’t smell like smoke. I don’t know what it smelled like – but it was bad!

I turned off the A/C and drove home with the windows rolled down. Thank goodness it was not raining or I would have either gotten soaked from the rain by leaving the windows down, or soaked in sweat by having to leave them up. After I got the groceries put away I called Firestone and told the service manager what happened. Of course, he told me to bring it in, but I can’t go without my car for several days – especially not on the weekend. I asked him for a ballpark figure of what it would cost and he said probably between $800 and $1,500, depending on what is wrong. He can’t tell me without looking at it.

So I am just going to have to wait for my next paycheck and drive with the windows down for a week or so. That stinks – it has been so hot lately. We have had weeks of temperatures in the 90’s and feeling like in the 100’s. It is too hot to even go outside and cut the grass or walk with the dogs. I just want to stay inside where it is cool and just hide from the heat as much as I can.

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Too Dry for Fireworks?

We have been in a terrible drought this summer and several places are having a lot of wildfires. The one in Colorado is really scary – I have friends that live in Colorado Springs and that is where my brother lived for 2 years while he was in school. It makes me very sad to see the thousands of acres of mountains and all those beautiful homes being burned. And all those poor animals – it is a real tragedy!

It is also a problem for a lot people who have big plans for this weekend and for the Fourth of July. I have heard rumors that the police and fire departments are canceling their community fireworks shows and not allowing private citizens to shoot off any fireworks in their yards or neighborhoods, either. What a shame, but I totally support them in being careful about not wanting any wildfires here. We can celebrate in other ways and maybe next year we won’t have to worry about a drought.

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Sundays

Today is Sunday March 11!  I am feeling very relaxed and have decided to make myself some lemonade and go sit outside in my beautiful lawn.  I have never had a house before or at least not a house with such a big yard.  The sun is shining but not too brightly and the wind is blowing just a little bit.  It is hard to believe that this is the middle of March and not the middle of July.  I am so thankful for the warm weather.

The winter was calm this year in the south followed by an early spring.  There is something amazing about the beauty of a warm, sunny day.  I’m not quite sure what it is.  Sometimes I feel that it’s too good to be true.  When you hear that there is some bad in every good it makes you wonder if that person ever saw the beauty of a sunrise or a perfect spring day.  I don’t know about you but I can’t find one thing wrong with the beauty of this day.

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Indian Summer

The weather turned cold last week and we had freeze warnings on Thursday and Friday night. So I brought in my plants and will keep them inside for the winter. I have been tending these plants for several years and I would be so very upset to lose them to frost or freezing.

Just when I was resigned to wearing a jacket and getting used to the cold again, the weather forecast has called for temps back in the upper 70’s and 80’s this week. So I guess we are having an Indian Summer.

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Raking Leaves

The leaves are starting to turn color and blow off the trees. I might have to actually rake my yard for the first time this weekend. It makes me sad to have to acknowledge that summer is really over, even though the days get warm and we have not had a frost yet. But the falling leaves are tough to deny. Autumn is definitely here!

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My Dogs Allergies

This time of year I have to give all 5 dogs a bath several times a week  to get the pollen off them. I suffer from hayfever and we all bring pollen into the house after being outdoors.

Did you know that dogs can be allergic to grass? My white and black dogs are extremely allergic. I have to give them foot baths every night to soother their irritated feet. That sounds weird, even to me. lol The foot baths are just making them stand in the tub for 10 minutes – I’m not massaging their feet and painting their toenails or anything. lol

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Fireflies

About this time of year we start seeing fireflies in the yard as the sun sets. They are just harmless little beetles who light up briefly as they fly around the yard looking for their friends. I used to run around the grass and catch them, then save them in an empty mayonnaise jar. But after one night of captivity I would set them free the next day. After all, they were not going to be happy living inside a mayonnaise jar – they wanted to fly free and be with their friends.

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Straight Line Winds

When you see the incredible amount of damage that wind can do, you gain a new respect for the power of Mother Nature. In Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Illinois we see dozens, if not hundreds, of tornadoes every year. This part of America is known as Tornado Alley.

But there is another kind of wind damage that gets reported on the weather and news channels now. These are straight line winds. The winds is extremely powerful and can do as much damage as a tornado, but the wind does not rotate – it just goes screaming across the land in a straight line, leveling everything in its path.

I believe both kinds of wind do a lot of damage every year, especially in Tornado Alley. We had some winds last night that broke off tree branches, knocked down full grown trees, blew trash cans and patio furniture across the yard and flipped empty 18 wheeler trailers. They say we did not have a tornado come through here last night, but the amount of damage looks like it. It must have been some strong straight line winds then.

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A-choo!

Wow – this girl has been sneezing all day long. What’s in the air that is making me sneeze?

I don’t have “allergies” like so many people seem t have. But with everything blooming and pollen everywhere, there must be something new out there. I have gone through half a box of Kleenex and scared my dogs a at least a dozen times with my big sneezes!