Tornadoes?!?!? Up HERE!?!?!
There is far too much on my mind for one journal entry tonight...so I'll scatter them.
Today has been the absolute strangest day of my life since Hurricane Bob blew through the region 20 years ago.
It's been hot and uncomfortable up here recently...humid, muggy...ugh. We finally some help with some heavy thunderstorms today. My part of Massachusetts was lucky...we got just heavy rain and it came early. But it was still an adventure.
The storm system that just ripped through here was actually powerful enough to force up tornado watches in a large swath of New England...all of New Hampshire, all but the most extreme west of Massachusetts, a good chunk of Rhode Island and Connecticut, too. This region isn't known for tornadoes, so the alerts, when they came up at 1pm, hit like a shock to my system. I was fortunate to get to come home from work when things were quiet.
In Melrose, where I am, we just got heavy rain. But we were very lucky. There are a minimum of two confirmed tornadoes (official number not yet in), one of which tore through Springfield to the south, causing incredible damage to buildings. No word yet on casaulties. I hope there weren't any.
It was nerve-wracking to be part of the tornado watch area...it's one of those things I never hope to actually see. As I type this the storm watch has just expired, which is helping settle my nerves some.
The storms did do one thing I appreciated. The newsmen around here had talked about nothing but the Stanley Cup Finals (Boston vs. Vancouver) for about three straight days now. The storm damage forced them to shut up and cover the storm damage instead, proving for what must be the umpteen-millionth time an old marketing adage about news I learned the first time through college: Bad news sells. Worse news sells even better.
I don't like it when local newsmen have sports as a top story. No sport is that important. Not even the World Cup, which I used to follow religiously (that's a topic for a future entry).
Today has been the absolute strangest day of my life since Hurricane Bob blew through the region 20 years ago.
It's been hot and uncomfortable up here recently...humid, muggy...ugh. We finally some help with some heavy thunderstorms today. My part of Massachusetts was lucky...we got just heavy rain and it came early. But it was still an adventure.
The storm system that just ripped through here was actually powerful enough to force up tornado watches in a large swath of New England...all of New Hampshire, all but the most extreme west of Massachusetts, a good chunk of Rhode Island and Connecticut, too. This region isn't known for tornadoes, so the alerts, when they came up at 1pm, hit like a shock to my system. I was fortunate to get to come home from work when things were quiet.
In Melrose, where I am, we just got heavy rain. But we were very lucky. There are a minimum of two confirmed tornadoes (official number not yet in), one of which tore through Springfield to the south, causing incredible damage to buildings. No word yet on casaulties. I hope there weren't any.
It was nerve-wracking to be part of the tornado watch area...it's one of those things I never hope to actually see. As I type this the storm watch has just expired, which is helping settle my nerves some.
The storms did do one thing I appreciated. The newsmen around here had talked about nothing but the Stanley Cup Finals (Boston vs. Vancouver) for about three straight days now. The storm damage forced them to shut up and cover the storm damage instead, proving for what must be the umpteen-millionth time an old marketing adage about news I learned the first time through college: Bad news sells. Worse news sells even better.
I don't like it when local newsmen have sports as a top story. No sport is that important. Not even the World Cup, which I used to follow religiously (that's a topic for a future entry).
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