Monday, March 05, 2007

Mild Manic Monday – Blow!

You all really want to see if I can keep this clean, don’t you? I’ll tell you right now, I can’t do it. I think Morgen over at It’s A Blog Eat Blog World watched one too many episodes of Dante’s Cove when he chose Blow for this week's word.

I had so many things going through my head that I went into overload. So you, dear readers, get two Manic Monday posts – one mild and one wild. (Wink wink.) This is the mild post. Scroll down for a brief but meaningful wild Manic Monday.


Since I was born and raised in the state of Kansas, I can’t let the word blow go by without talking about tornados. I will tell you right now, if one person leaves any sort of Dorothy or Toto comment, I will kick your ass. Trust me, those comments got old by the time I was five. Now that I’m 35, I pretty much just want to throw down when someone spits out a yellow brick road comment when they find out I’m from Kansas. Dude, let’s have some originality.

But I digress. I may have mentioned before that I grew up in a small Kansas town. One of the many duties my dad did for the city was to serve as tornado spotter. When it stormed, my dad would head outside of town and see how close the tornados were to the city.

On occasion, I went with him, and let me tell you, there is nothing more incredibly amazing than seeing one of those big f*ckers blow right toward you. If you ever see a tornado in person, you will not only be amazed, but you will have a tremendous amount of respect for mother nature.

Above is a great photo of an F-5 tornado that hit south central Kansas (where I’m from) in 1991. (See this Web site for more information, including photos and video clips from the Andover tornado.)

I definitely did not grow up to be a tornado chaser. There have been too many times in my life that I have been too close to them. These days, when I hear those tornado sirens, my husband and I are much more comfortable grabbing the kids and the cats and heading to the basement. Someday I’ll have to tell you about how we had to spend Eric’s birthday in the basement eating birthday cake because we were in the middle of a tornado. Oh, the joys of living in Kansas!

9 comments:

Desert Songbird said...

I wouldn't DARE make a Dorothy or Toto comment - my in-laws are from Topeka, and hubby was born in Manhattan when my FIL was a student at K-State.

I hate, hate, HATE tornadoes; luckily, we don't get many of those in AZ, but we had our share in IN!

Mine Manic Monday post is up!

Donna. W said...

Hey sister, you puke on me... I puke back. I've had YEARS more practice.

I've lived my whole life in tornado alley, by the way, and so far haven't seen a single one. May it stay that way forever.

Travis Cody said...

That is a tremendous and frightening photograph. After seeing that, there's no way I'd make a WOO comment.

I'll take a good earthquake over that any day.

Great idea for the theme!

Mine will be up later.

Janna said...

Tornadoes scare the hell out of me. After my home was destroyed, I learned to be very VERY nervous at the sound of strong winds.

crazymumma said...

The word 'blow' just makes me think of cocaine. sigh. I miss the eighties. ahem. anyway. Where were we? Ah yes, as to your pseudo pornographic post below and 'the tongue'? My curiosity is piqued Neila. Piqued indeedy....

Sadie said...

I've never had a tornado hit in my part of town, but I've always been afraid of them. Once when I was a kid and we were under tornado watch (not a warning, just a watch) I piled up all my stuffed animals and dolls in a "safe place." and we have a plan for corralling the animals and getting to the basement. I like to be prepared.

Mo and The Purries said...

D'oh.
Of course, all I want to talk about now is...
the banned stuff...

Let's see.
.
.
.
We had a tiny tornado come through our yard when I was growing up. Freaking amazing how you could see EXACTLY the path. It literally missed hitting our house by like ten feet.
Even though it was a tiny twister, it did a LOT of damage. We weren't home at the time, but our dog was -- she was chained up to the carport, which was GONE. Jo (the dog) was physically fine, but mentally she was never the same again. Thunder would make her FREAK out. And a car back-fired once, and she tore down our screen door to get into the house.

Okay, there. I left a comment without mentioning any banned subject. Do you frickin' know how hard this was for me?????

Anonymous said...

I have a huge paranoia of tornadoes! We had one here in Connecticut once when I was a kid and remember that day to a tee and the aftermath I saw in town. You know I am having a bad time if I am dreaming of tornadoes and or elevators.

Sunrunner said...

My oldest son is paranoid of tornados, and has been ever since the first time he heard the tornado siren the city added to our neighborhood. The thing is freakin'loud!!! The funny thing is that we usually have at least one tornado come relatively close to the house (within blocks) every year. Ian and I used to go storm chasing before we had kids, but we never got to chase an actual tornado. I have a great respect for those people who watch for or chase tornados!