I got yesterday's half right, I said socks :) Shopping spree (always worked for me) A good cry Ice cream

Well, I went in to DS' room on Friday for his class play and also to say goodbye to the teacher. The replacement teacher was there, too. She is RIGHT OUT OF COLLEGE! It turns out that our district hires teachers right out of college on a 9 month contract to be permanent subs. They can sub at a different school every day, or be granted a long term sub job like in DS' situation. This burns me even more - that there is a pool of teachers waiting to fill in, that the pool is replentished every year, and the districut still would not grant the teacher a leave for health reasons. I am also burned that DS will have a brand new teacher for the rest of the year. I know that everyone has to start somewhere, but we had a HORRIBLE experience in kindergarten with a first year teacher and we ended up taking DS out of private school after 3 months because of the teacher's ineptitude. Unfortunately, now that he is in public school, we don't have that option unless we want to move. I'm just praying for the best, maybe this new teacher will have it together a lot more than the one that taught kindergarten.

We're sort of in between Frisco and Ada, but both are well east of I35, Lone Jack, and we are a bit west of it. I was watching the radar like a hawk. At about this time last year, the same places from Denton to Frisco had horrible hail storms (widespread baseball to softball sized and also tennis ball sized sort of along the edges of the bigger hail) about two weeks apart. So very many homes, cars, etc. were just demolished....and so was a lot of landscaping, gardens, etc. Ada's bigger worry was the storm that put down several funnel clouds, but I've only heard of a couple of structures being damaged. Maybe the news of more damage just isn't getting out yet. While the funnels were the feared thing that sent folks scurrying for shelter, it seems like a lot of the actual damage was more from wind and hail. Our electric co-op also has a lot of customers in the Ada area. We had about 100 homes without electricity here while they replaced poles that snapped in half, but Ada had closer to 600 when I checked the co-op's webpage outage map last night. We have a great electric co-op and I know the linemen were out working hard to restore power just as soon as the lightning was far enough away that it was safe for them to be out there. I appreciate them so much. Frisco is one of my favorite towns. It used to be a small quiet country town but has grown at a huge rate very quickly and has become so big that some folks now joke that Frisco is the big city and Dallas is the suburb. (Dallas and Dallasites don't care for this joke at all.) Even though Frisco is big and very developed, I still like it. Somehow the city leaders have worked to keep the same level of friendliness that you have in a small town, and the developers have worked hard with landscaping and such to make all the concrete development more appealing. When I want a day of shopping (which is rare) for something other than groceries and garden supplies, Frisco is my top choice of places to go. Ada is much smaller---maybe 6,000 or 7,000 people and still very rural/semi-rural. I've only been there a couple of times. I like it fine. The people there are great. I hope they can bounce back quickly from all the storm damage. I have to sing the praises of modern batteries. We were careful to have all our phones and laptop/tablet batteries charged fully before the storm hit, so even though we lost power we were not completely cut off from the world. We still were able to communicate by phone and text message, and had Facebook on and off. The internet was on and off, but off for good after the power died, and the storm knocked out the satellite TV long before the actual storm conditions arrived here. Even our fire radios were quiet for quite a while (I'm guessing they may have had a power issue or a repeater issue in town for a bit) but then they came back to life. Even without the radios we could communicate with other first responders via the GroupMe app on our cell phones. I remember the old days when you went to the tornado shelter with your flashlight and that was about it. Now we can take our cell phones, laptops, fire radios, etc. and not feel quite so cut off from civilization, and it is so much better than way. The images of car windshields and back windows completely demolished by hail are just stunning. I know we see photos like that every year---and not just in TX and OK but also from many other states, and yet, seeing them shocks me every time. The power of Mother Nature in raging thunderstorms and tornadoes is awesome indeed. We are in the Enhanced risk area again for tomorrow unless something changes. We had been in the Enhanced risk area yesterday but then they upgraded us to Moderate risk yesterday morning, so we did expect trouble. The best thing I can say is that maybe the rain will make us green up more quickly and cause a corresponding drop in the fire activity. Stay safe, everyone. This week's weather isn't looking real friendly.

Had to add this even though it doesnt fit the theme. its just too true.