Too Much Twister

I don't usually post on Saturday, mainly because I like to pretend that I can make up for all my neglectful-mama behavior during the week by paying tons of attention to the munchkin on Saturday and Sunday. Also, hubby is home on Saturdays, and we get all manner of have-to-house-do's done on Saturday. Saturday is the only day that hubby is home that the garbage dump is open... IE: the only day garbage will go down to the dump... among other things.

But the last 48+ hours have been something spectacular. Not spectacular good, but eye popping and jaw dropping none-the-less.

Thursday, hubby found out that he was out of work as of Friday. The dealership he's worked for for over two years had scaled back as far as they could in the Service Department (hubby was the only mechanic, and there was only one parts guy and a service manager for the entire dealership) but it was still not financially feasible to stay open. They closed the service department. Hubby is now, like so many others around the country, unemployed.

So yesterday, knowing it was hubby's last day, I'm cleaning house and all the other things I like to do when hubby isn't home, since he'll totally be home All-The-Time even though he's job hunting; when I look outside and see scary clouds.

I call hubby to have him check Weatherbug on his work computer even as my brain is saying, "Aria, you've just spent two days in a row watching Twister on blue-ray and you're totally being a weather hypochondriac, chill the hell out!" Except that I get hubby on the phone and he says that Oh-Hey, there's a Weatherbug alert flashing on the screen... and guess what, it's a 5-hour-MoFoing-Tornado-Watch for the county that I happen to be calling him from. YEAH.

So I stop the housework and take the fastest shower of my life, and go outside to make sure that I'm not spazzing for nothing. Cause, to be honest, most of the time when weather type things go down, for some reason we're in the nothing-happening-here-bubble cause we're way location-blessed like that. Not yesterday though. I go out to chain smoke so I don't freak the fuck out check the sky for a few minutes and in my head, I hear my inner voice telling me to get gone, NOW.

My inner voice probably saw the many funnel clouds dipping down out of the big ole super-cell cloud just like they showed on the Special Features of the Twister disc, the one that was a History Channel real-science-not-CGI show about tornadoes. Ummm, Yeah. So I call hubby to say that we're gonna try to make it to where he is, and into a big garbage bag went all the things I felt we couldn't live without in case the trailer got picked up like Dorothy's house and not put back down. The whole time, my inner voice is getting a little squeaky and kinda loud as it starts telling me to, "Move fasterFasterFASTER".

Garbage bag and fully stocked diaper bag go into the trunk, munchkin gets whisked into the car without pants, socks or shoes... I have them, but they're in the trunk. I turn on the car and the radio is spouting nothing but static... on every channel. By now, I'm thoroughly freaked the Eff out. And I have to drive toward what looks to be the worst part of the sky to get to hubby. All my 20-year-old-bat-outta-hell-gas-pedal-to-the-floor-turn-on-the-nitrous-and-break-off-the-switch instincts returned, and thanks to adrenaline, they weren't even dusty, despite not breaking them out since I became a mother over 10 years ago. Luckily I've always been a very strong driver. I may not know where I'm going, but I can drive like a pro regardless.

Normally the drive takes 40 minutes. We made it up to hubby's shop in 25, despite the switchback section, the road construction section and the full-ass-freeway section. Munchkin, God love him, was asleep in the car seat like nothing out of the ordinary was going on. My breathing returned to normal, and I stopped being so concerned. If we were going to get wiped off the planet, at least we'd do it all together. I was OK with that.

About 2 hours later, hubby was done with his last day, so we started the drive home in our respective cars. The weather had headed our way, and while there were no funnel clouds to be seen, there were lightening strikes aplenty along with blind-you sheets of rain coming down. This time the drive took 65 minutes, because even with the wipers slappin' away on high, I could barely see hubby's bumper ahead of me. We made it home, the trailer was still standing and it was even clear~ish here.

I woke up this morning to a thunder clap so loud I jumped awake. Today is just as torrentially rainy, has just as many lightening strikes and shake-the-walls thunder as yesterday's storm, but with one huge exception... no funnel clouds. And we're all home together. I'm not even in the slightest bit freaked out today.

And as far as the job? We'll be alright. He'll either find something better or we'll hit the lotto. That's my mindset, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it. I refuse to put negative energy out there about the situation, but if you want to throw us some prayers it would be appreciated. Just Sayin'...