Florida Storms last night:
Bud came in from work last night and said, "I heard we're supposed to get some rain and a cool front is behind it!" I said, "Great!!" That was around 8:45pm. It was still hot and humid, somewhere around 74 degrees and very muggy.
I took the dogs out for their final time out before I went to bed around midnight. Opened the door and it was pouring rain and quite cool, tremendously windy. My smallest, Cheenie, who thinks everything below 85 is positively frigid, ran out so happy to be going out, out from under the porch cover, hit the grass, made a quick 180° right back to the porch, up the steps to the door. Turned and looked at me like, "WHAT is wrong with you!! Winter has come! QUICKLY! TAKE SHELTER!" LOL
I heard Noah come in around 1am when Moose started doing his goofy bark that's just for Noah. That's my alarm for "Noah's home safe." Then I fell into a deep sleep till I heard my phone on the nightstand make some strange tone that I wasn't familiar. I opened my eyes enough to see the clock said 3:12am. I didn't even look at it. I thought it was an odd tone for an app or software update. Right back to sleep. Didn't move again till the alarm went off at 6.
When I got around to looking at my phone a bit later I saw this which was the message delivered at 3:11am from Sprint towers:
Uhm.... thank you? I guess? I mean I'm glad they send them, but it really didn't do much good since the tone was so, common. I thought, Oh WOW! Oh my gosh we are so lucky!! I went to open the back door to see if there was any damage. The temps were back up, warmer than at midnight, humidity in full effect, and still raining - this was what we woke up to outside:
And much like your snows and cold - yes everyone still left and went to work. LOL Took a few hours, but most of the waters have receded from around the house. The planting fields are still underwater, nearest the canal, which means I will NOT be walking the dogs over there. The alligators that use the canal as a migration route between lakes will be up at the edge with a possibility of being in the field. They're not huge, but big enough to harm or kill one of the dogs. Normal size for the canal is between 3 and 5 feet.
We were in the path of the storm cells causing tornadoes. The family which lost both grandparents was in Duette (the one making national news), which is about 30 minutes south of us. Our county, Polk, had a few funnels and some touch downs, but no major reported damage, just water levels. Still raining and yea-to-me, temps will continue to drop throughout the day.
Please continue prayers and positive thought for those south and west of us who did lose their homes, were injured and lost loved ones.