Weekend Wrap-up

We had a violent windstorm called a derecho sweep in from out of town and destroy everything on Friday night, and the fact that we don't even have an English term for it tells me that something is wrong with immigration policy. The initial gust of wind split the neighbor's tree right down the middle to come crashing into my backyard. I was in my home office working on a proposal only fifteen yards away, so it was lucky that the branch hadn't fallen at a slightly different angle. As it was, I NARROWLY ESCAPED WITH MY LIFE, and the tree is allowed to get closer and closer to my office in subsequent retellings in future years.

While I was running through the house dangerously looking through all of the windows for impaling debris, Booty maintained her (very small) level head and took shelter in a sturdy zone.

The next morning, my neightborhood had power, thanks to the ancient common sense construction method called "underground power lines" although phone coverage was gone. The Internet vanished around 9 AM, probably as the result of a Verizon team trying to fix the cell tower and seeing ample opportunity for Comcast sabotage. I spent the afternoon in the Reston office with a few other proposal-y folks who lacked the necessities of telecommuting and then I returned home (dodging swarms of people searching for places to recharge all of their useless junk) in the evening for a second derecho which was barely noticeable at all. I would name the first one Irina Derecho and the second one Katya Derecho, if weather patterns were named after Alias characters.

The second one did manage to give me a weather migraine, which sent me to bed around 8 PM. In exchange for this negative mark on my weekend, the Internet was available to me when I woke up at 6 AM on Sunday. My parents stopped by briefly to borrow my Internet connection, but otherwise it has been a quiet, migraine-free, wind-free Sunday.

Meanwhile, Rebecca went to a parade in Bellevue, Iowa, which hopefully didn't turn out anything like .