Woooo! It is a bit breezy!

[Clipper]

Wow, we have had severe weather warnings since about 4pm. We were in Kingsport to do an errand and eat supper. We got home just ahead of the weather. We just had time to unload some groceries and take the dog out to pee before it hit us.

I was in the back yard with the dog and could see HUGE storm clouds moving quickly toward us. We just got everything secure, with lawn furniture in the garage and car under the carport when the wind began to blow. It got real nasty real quickly. The storm was moving at 60mph with straight line winds up to 65-70 mph and gusts up to 80 when the front moved over us. When the warnings with a tornado watches and warnings of rotation to our South and West got serious and people were told to seek shelter we went to the garage shelter and turned on the NOAA radio. I thought I saw a woman with a little dog in the basket of her bicycle blow by about 100 feet off of the ground but I might be mistaken, lol.

The brunt of the storm has passed now and we are back in the house, but an 80 foot Georgia pine that is over 4 ft across at the stump uprooted and blew down next door, tearing the weather head off his house and leaving live wires hanging low across the road. Everyone has been stopping and turning around. All but one stupid ass woman that came breezing through and snagged a wire on the luggage rack on her car, leaving her snagged with the wire wedged under something on the car so that she could not pull it off. Thank goodness it was a telephone or cable line, not a primary power line. Stupid at any rate. Who is to say that the power line wasn't laying across that wire somewhere energizing it. I can't believe that we did not lose power. The lines are down about a quarter of a mile down the road also.

Fortunately we have no damage. It is just a steady drizzle now, raining at a rate of 1.4 inches per hour. Still more thunder storms coming, but only with 35 or 40 mph gusts. The severe thunderstorm warnings expired at 7pm.

[Clipper]

There has been a Sherrif's Deputy parked at the end of our driveway, turning around traffic that comes down the road, and a fire truck about a quarter of a mile down turning traffic coming from the other direction around. The storm blew through about 6:30 and that deputy has been parked out there since about 7pm. The power company is so tied up with lines down that they won't be getting to this job until tomorrow. The county highway department is putting up "road closed" signs in front of our house and down where the other wires across the road are. Then the poor cop and those firemen can go on their way and be back in service. I went out and offered to make the deputy a cup of coffee and a sandwich but he was all set with energy drinks in his cooler and snacks.

I am glad we didn't lose power, seeing as how it is going to be tomorrow before they make repairs. There are lines down and thousands without power all over the Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia. It was a short duration storm but powerful.

I will be busy tomorrow. I lost a part of an ash tree, about 6 or 8 inches in diameter and 20 or so feet long and a major limb on one of the maples in the side yard is split and bending downward. The neighborhood is going to be buzzing with the sound of chain saws and wood chippers tomorrow.

[Clipper]

The road is still closed and the lines are still laying across the road. I took two thermal cups of coffee over to the neighbors next door whose power line was torn from the house and are without power. They have to have an electrical contractor replace their weather head before the power company can reconnect them and the power company is swamped with calls and have no estimate as to when they will be able to fix or move the wires so the county can re-open the road.

Just sharpened my chain saw chains and came in for coffee. Time to get off of here and get to work cutting up the downed and split limbs. We were lucky. There are still 1400 homes without power, down from 3000 last night. Northwest of us in Virginia a man was killed when a tree fell on his truck as he was driving. The storm damage is pretty widespread.

[Clipper]

They just came through and moved the downed wires out of the road and re-opened the road. There is a lot of wind damage all over the area. It tore a carwash all to hell not too far from us in SW Virginia. 70mph winds blowing through the carwash from one end to the other really did a lot of damage to the building and equipment.

[Atticus Pizzaballa]

Wow what an ordeal. I am happy you and Kathy came out of this without problems. I have been in winds as strong as that and stronger and they do much damage. I remember the storm that hit Utica and did a lot of damage to where I was living at upper Mohawk Street near Parkway. Snapped a huge pine tree in half which causes wires to fall into the street.

[BHU]

Glad to hear you guys are safe & with no major damage. We've been enjoying a beautiful stretch of spring weather up here but tonight we're in for a hard freeze.

[Clipper]

It was beautiful here today also. I managed to cut up the large branch that had fallen on my property and then spent the afternoon cutting up a 20 foot Bradford pear tree that blew over in a bowling friends yard along with a cedar tree about the same size. It was supper time before I finished. Tomorrow is going to be nice also. I will be able to get back up in the garden, finish putting up the fence around it, and plant the rest of the squash plants I didn't get in the ground the other day.

[BHU]

It was 28* when I got up today @0630. I have a rose bush that I haven't planted yet out in the garage but I think it will be ok. It may go in the ground today. I still haven't decided on a garden yet & I'll be damned yesterday morning I saw another groundhog chowing down out near the fence we put up a year ago. I went out & spooked him to see where he'd go & sure enough he retreated back under the fence to that idiot's yard behind us where they all came from last year. Unbelievable. The Have A Heart will be set out & baited later today. Here we go again.

[clarencebunsen]

May 18, 2023 7:36:14 GMT -5 BHU said:

It was 28* when I got up today @0630. I have a rose bush that I haven't planted yet out in the garage but I think it will be ok. It may go in the ground today. I still haven't decided on a garden yet & I'll be damned yesterday morning I saw another groundhog chowing down out near the fence we put up a year ago. I went out & spooked him to see where he'd go & sure enough he retreated back under the fence to that idiot's yard behind us where they all came from last year. Unbelievable. The Have A Heart will be set out & baited later today. Here we go again.

Happy hunting.

[Clipper]

We have at least one of all God's garden raiding critters that seem to love our back yard and garden. I found a solution several years ago. It works really well and didn't cost much to acquire.

www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/mutual-industries-4-ft-x-100-ft-warning-barrier-orange-fence-14993-0-48-1857162?cid=Shopping-Bing-Product1857162-&msclkid=217d18a00a9c1f36b1cf7cc61574a92c&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Shopping%20-%20All%20Products&utm_term=4585375807245420&utm_content=All%20Products

I purchased a 100 foot roll of this stuff several years ago now. I actually unrolled enough of the 100 ft roll to go around half my garden's border and took a scissors and snipped the 4 foot height down to two 2 foot pieces. I erect the fencing around the garden using 4 steel T posts for corner posts, and then add support in between those posts with wooden tomato stakes and zip ties. It kept our groundhog at bay but I ended up shooting the poor thing after a second confrontation with our dog cornering it in the corner of the wooden fence around the back yard. I never knew that ground hogs could be aggressive, but found that they can be snarling and snapping defenders if cornered. Sadly I had to send the poor thing to woodchuck heaven. In your case you would probably be better off shooting the neighbor, and trapping the groundhogs, lol.

[Atticus Pizzaballa]

No ground hog but there is a very well fed rabbit hopping around the side yard and it is a rather large rabbit.