The Weather Changes Fast in the Desert and other Crazy Events



Stormy Skies - Sunni's Photo's

 

Thursday it was 107 around here and Friday was 100.  The coming week is supposed to be in the 90’s.  In the late afternoons, we’ve been having a bank of very black skies roll up over the mountains.  We usually get thunder and lightning, but no rain, or very little.

 Friday afternoon the same thing happened, however, within minutes the wind was blowing about 60 MPH.  I’m not kidding!  The dust kicked up all around.  The red sand was so thick that it blocked out the black clouds in a dusty haze.

 

Stormy Skies - Sunni's Photo's

 

I was fixing dinner and we were about ready to serve up when the barbeque went whizzing past the kitchen window and off the patio.  It landed in the grass on its side.  This all happened so fast, within seconds, and this is no small barbeque either.  We got it up-righted, back on the patio, and pushed up against the wall of the house.

 

Of course, in all the commotion, a tree bent over near the breaking point, having come loose out of its tie, so we had to take car of that before it snapped off.  This kind of thing always happens with the wind around here, but is usually in the wintertime when we have to bundle up and try to stay warm at thirty degrees.  Naturally, after all this, we are very windblown and dinner is cold.

 

Then the wind stopped as suddenly as it started.  The dark clouds returned after the dust settled.  We had a thunder and lightning show. The good news is it brought the temperature down to 80 degrees.  This was a relief.

 

Cloud Rainbow - Sunni's Photo's

 

On Saturday, it was about 85 for a high, which is unheard of for July around here, so we decided to make use of this and work out in the storage area to see what we can weed out in preparation for our move later this year.  This turned out to be a trip into the world of nostalgia because I found a couple boxes of stuff I had moved with me when I left Alaska in the late 1970’s.  The mementoes have travelled with me to Oregon, then California, and most recently to Utah.  It will go with me to the next place as well because I cannot part with this stuff now.  Someday, I’ll post more about my nostalgia boxes.  Needless to say, we had to tape those back up and there was no time for reminiscing now, if we were going to accomplish anything.

 

When we came in a little after four in the afternoon, we were both hot and sweaty so we dug into the ice cream to cool off.  So what happens?  The ice cream scoop breaks!  We’ve had it for at least twenty years, so I wasn’t all that surprised.  I don’t think they even make that type anymore so that has to go on the shopping list.

 

Later when I’m cleaning up the dishes after dinner, I spot a shirtless man up on the bluff behind the house carrying a rifle and holding a can of beer.  Of course, no one is supposed to have guns back there in the desert land behind us.  We have to chase off teenage boys now and then with their pellet rifles because they go out there to hunt the wildlife.

 

Our neighbor - Sunni's Photo's

 

So my husband goes out and shouts at the man, who promptly tells him “he will blow his head off.”  Oh dear!  My husband comes in and calls the police.  The man comes toward the house with the rifle.  When he gets to the back wall, my husband recognizes him as our neighbor who hooked up our TV.  What to do now because the police are on the way?  My husband informs the neighbor and he says he is up there with his family.  He proceeds to drop the gun and his ammo over the wall and into our backyard.  Of course, the neighbor was joking; however, he quickly learned not to say something like that to anyone.  He walked back up the hill and soon his wife and three sons joined him on their bicycles.  They all waved at us.

 

The guy and his family went home and when the police arrived, we explained the situation.  Then my husband took the gun and ammo back down to the neighbor’s house after the police left.  I’m glad this doesn’t happen often.  Usually we have a quiet life compared to most.