Derecho

 On Friday, a major wind and thunderstorm blew into town, causing all sorts of mayhem.  Power went out, trees went down, cars and houses were crushed.  The DC-MD-VA metro area was a mess.  We were without power, and when the temperature is also breaking heat records, no power is no fun.

The storm is called "derecho"-- a widespread, long-lived wind storm that comes with a band of rapidly moving showers.  It is a Spanish word that means "long line" and such a storm can produce wind gusts similar to a tornado.  The damage is typically in a straight line, and if the wind damaged area is more than 240 miles, and includes wind gusts of between 70-90 mph, it is a derecho.

We were sorta caught unawares.  I happened to check Facebook about 10:15 on Friday night, and say multiple status updates that a major storm was heading our way.  Will got out and walked the dog before the winds came and then we watched as the lightening made is seem like it was board daylight and the trees start to bend in half.  Just as the storm kicked off, we had two brown outs before we completely lost power.  Half of the District is without power and the power company is saying that they won't be able to restore power until Friday, July 6th by 11 pm.  (note: we got it back on Tuesday evening).

What is so random-- irritating?-- is that our next door neighbor have power.  We are running an extension cord from an outside outside outlet so we can run our fridge, which, turns out to the be most needed appliance when the lights are out.  

With the heat reaching 100+º F, the next few days are going to be a doozey.