Storms.

I woke this morning to hear the news of Storm St Jude and the damage caused across the south of England. I can’t remember any other storm being named when I was there. I know hurricanes and cyclones get named and now it seems storms are too. Ok, so it looked quite windy as I watched some woman get blown over in the street. It looked a pretty bad storm“Good God!” said Dulcie watching too, “The World is going mad!”We have a storm bird here. I haven’t heard it but a few times I have been having breakfast and Dulcie will say “I heard the storm bird,” and Will will say, “Yes, I did too.” He has mimicked the sound for me but it does not seem anything special. How disappointing! It would be so much better if it sounded like an air-raid siren going off or just a piercing scream! (Apparently there is an owl that does that...the Powerful Owl...I’m yet to hear that too).No one mentioned the storm bird this morning...funny because later in the day we had a storm. Perhaps it was the storm bird’s day off...perhaps it was ill and stayed at home...perhaps it did sing out and no one heard it. We will never know...or care.I got some washing out and then helped Dulcie roll out another ‘batch a’biscuits’ before heading down under the house to tend ‘our nest’. You will remember, if you have been paying attention, that we are intending to move into the room under Will’s mum’s house. We have the ‘bargain’ bed but at the moment I am just painting the walls. I started yesterday and did 2 walls and went down today to finish off the rest.I came up for a ‘pickled pork’ lunch and Dulcie said she had been watching the weather and a storm was coming. She put the weather channel on and the fellow was saying we could expect a storm between 2pm and 6pm. It was gloriously sunny outside! If I was a storm bird I would have been fooled! I brought the washing in just in case and went back to my painting.It had been very hot and did feel very close. The temperature was supposed to be 31 degrees but it didn’t feel too bad to me. I heard the first clap of distant thunder about 12.45pm. How quickly it clouded over! The thunder got louder and then it started to rain. I had to slide the windows closed and take my chances with the paint fumes. It didn’t rain long so I opened the window again. A lovely cool breeze rushed in. It deserved a name. I called it ‘Betty.’There was a loud clap of thunder and it started to rain again but this time it did not come in the window so I was able to leave it open. It was heavy rain and soon the gutters outside were flowing. Water here is precious. I can see why houses collect the rainwater off their roof into tanks. It would have half filled a tank no doubt in the short time this storm lasted.The trouble with storms here, apparently, is hail! The house here has fixed shutters that are there to protect the windows from hail. We got no hail this time. The storm lasted about 30 minutes and then the sky brightened again. Dulcie came down to tell me that there had been hail at Tamworth and there had been a hailstorm in Sydney.‘It’s brightening up now,’ I said.‘No, they say it’s not over yet.’ She said.We got no more thunder but it did cloud over again and rain some more. I’ll check the rain gauge tomorrow to see how much we got.Even before the rain stopped there was a beautiful sunset over the houses across the street. I went out to view it and saw some fruit bats flying over silhouetted against the sky. It reminded me...this is Australia.  

(Click on pictures to enlarge)

As I looked at the sunset I remembered that tomorrow we are going to Frogknot!That instant of realisation would have been the ideal moment for an ominous clap of thunder!It didn't come...but out there, under that sky, was a lonely house that had not been disturbed for 14 months!Whatever next?!