Here are the preliminary event reports collected by the NWS :
http://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/reports/090410_rpts.html
http://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/reports/090409_rpts.html

These snips from the NOAA report maps, summarize these two days.

Here is a link to the preliminary report from the Huntsville NWS office:
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/hun/stormsurveys/stormreports_new.php?yr=2009&mo=04&dy=10

A great many of these reports are fielded by ham radio operators, and relayed in near-real-time by SKYWARN radio networks to the NWS field offices. These reports provide valuable ground-confirmation of circumstances in specific locations as well as damage reports for further follow-up investigations. The NWS SKYWARN program provides training for these spotters and is genuinely appreciative of these efforts. We are fortunate in this area to have a strong committment to this program by so many capable and qualified volunteers.

One more piece of radar, this one showing just how many simultaneous tornado WARNING boxes were popping up along this front… this image from lunchtime Friday 10 Apr, 2009 …

And finally, a link to an informative site with very comprehensive insight into our local weather :

NSSTC Collaborative Weather Blog

OK everyone - enjoy watching the weather, but stay safe, and thanks   /;^)

More details on the STS-119 mission on http://www.nass.gov/shuttle of course.

Thanks  /;^)

And the governor kicks in at 115.

Today (Wednesday), I went from Columbia, MO to Laramie, WY. Yesterday, (Tuesday) which was the day I left, I went from Huntsville, AL to Columbia, MO.

According to my Rand McNally Deluxe Motor Carrier’s Road Atlas - I drove big trucks for a short while and carried everything from medical sponges & diesel engines to explosives. That was a blast! (pun intended) - HSV to Columbia, MO is 561 miles. Columbia to Laramie, WY is 767. Laramie, WY is about 60 miles west of Cheyenne, the state capitol.

Although, the most precious cargo I ever carried was human life.

While I was enrolled at the University of North Alabama in their Licensed Professional Counselor graduate school curriculum, I drove a school bus for elementary aged school children. It was a pleasant job, one which I enjoyed immensely. I recall with particular fondness a little Black boy whom was very precious to me. He always sat close by me and talked to me. One day, I learned I needed to add a new stop to pick up another family’s children. They were Hispanic, and the local women’s shelter had helped the mother find an anonymous location to hide her from her abusive spouse. You’d be amazed at the social history that school bus drivers need to know. One of the little boys’ name was Jesus.

In Spanish, the “j” is pronounced with the sound of “h”. Each day, as I picked up the children, I would greet them by name. Of course, that meant I would say something like, “Good morning, Jesus! How are you today?”

So, after a period of time, one afternoon Jesus went home early, which meant he wouldn’t be riding my bus that afternoon. As I awaited the afternoon school bell, the little Black boy climbed up the steps and said to me that, “Zeus won’t be riding this afternoon.”

I wondered what he was talking about, so I asked him. He explained to me that he was talking about the quiet little Hispanic boy.

It was then that I understood that for all that time, he had thought I was greeting Jesus saying, “Good morning! Hey, Zeus! How are you today?”

That’s been a source of great humor for me for quite some time.

Today, I’m going to try and make Lake Tahoe, which is on the Nevada/California state line. (I arrived at Reno @ 8:30pm PST and Lake Tahoe one hour later.) Which, according to the handy-dandy mileage chart, is about 900+ miles from Cheyenne. The listing was from Cheyenne to Reno, which were the two closest cities.

It’s a different feeling to sit behind the wheel for hours on end doing 80+ mph and not be concerned about it. Once you get past Kansas City, MO/KS, American topography gets mind-numbingly flat.

Specifically, it’s Nebraska that’s so flat. Because I got an extra hour of time (Wyoming in on Mountain Time), I decided to go on beyond Cheyenne to Laramie, which is where I stayed last night.

As I awakened this morning, I looked out the window and discovered it snowed overnight. About 4 inches fell. It’s still snowing just a little bit at 0700.

I crossed the mountains with little difficulty, though I traversed it doing between 34-50mph depending upon conditions.

I happened upon some unfortunate travelers, who identified themselves as being from Napa Valley, California. Their Toyota pickup truck/SUV thingy slipped off the road and flipped on its side. Though I didn’t witness the event, as I passed them, I saw a woman getting out of the opened side door, which alerted me that it was a recent event. I slowed down and stopped, turned around and put on my trauma nurse gear. Fortunately, the only injuries were a scraped elbow. Thanks be to God, eh? A UPS big truck driver had stopped, along with another female driver of a Ford 250 crew cap pick up, who let the three women get in with her. Shortly, a state DOT truck stopped by and surveyed the damage and attempted to contact the Highway Patrol. Seeing everything was under control, I left.

High wind gusts in several places, in conjunction with icy roads made travel over the mountain from Laramie treacherous.

Today, I made Reno, NV around 8:30pm PST, and am staying the evening with a relative of a friend in Lake Tahoe. Norm is back in Hartselle with his mother to attend his uncle Dean’s funeral in B’ham. Dean was a highly decorated WWII veteran and died recently.

Norm said to call him for instructions on how to start the Ferrari, but I politely declined, saying that, “perhaps it would be better for me to wait for you.”

It’s close to bed time for me, so I’ll wrap things up for now.

Sacramento, CA is my destination tomorrow, which is where I’ll need to get my California Nursing License. Why Alabama doesn’t honor other state’s nursing licenses (it’s called reciprocity - for example, your driver license is good in all 50 states, but my Nursing license is not) is beyond me. Sacramento is a little over 100 miles away, so I’ll be able to “sleep in,” which for me means not setting the alarm. I’ll probably be up around 6:30am, anyway. It seems my body does that kind of thing these days.

I’ll keep you updated.

Kind regards,

Kevin

Some of them are very nearly a year old. So please, as you read them, bear in mind the elapsed time frame, and consider the potential for change (however great or small) that may have, or yet may occur(ed) in the interim.

I greatly appreciate your understanding and continue to welcome your comments!

Thanks!

She lived nine years. She was absolutely and without question, THE most wonderful dog I’ve ever had the joy of owning. Her spirit and temperament were remarkable, and her drives were impeccable.

In fact, I started teaching her how to climb trees, after I taught her how to climb a ladder… the type you or I would use!

She had an amazing sniffer, too! Once, my nephew Jeremy was skeptical that Princess would find and retrieve a stick thrown into a messed up jungle of weeds well over knee high. I knew she could, because I trained her in weeds over 10 feet tall.

I told him, “go ahead and throw the stick. She’ll find it and bring it back to you.”

I could see the disbelief of skepticism in his eyes as he threw it as hard as he could. And, he did a good job.

Princess took off running!

She hunted and sniffed, hunted and sniffed, hunted and sniffed.

Jeremy lost interest quickly. I knew what she would do, so I stayed with Jeremy.

After perhaps five minutes, up ran Princess… with the stick in her mouth!

Jeremy was aghast! His teen-aged eyes were as big as saucers!

I had the satisfaction of saying, “I told you so!”

With the assistance of a good friend, I had trained her in the fundamentals of a canine sport called “Schutzhund.” There are three components to that internationally competitive sport. The first is obedience. The next is tracking, the third is protection. When people talk about “police dogs,” most often, that’s what they think about.

I recently found a video of what you DON’T want to happen… particularly if you are a K9 LEO (Law Enforcement Officer) handler.

The fellow wearing a bright yellow blazer is a police officer, perhaps most likely in England, and the suspect is being pursued by the LEO and his K9. Watch what happens!

Tomorrow, dog for sale.

Bad Police Dog! Bad Police Dog!

In this 2d season episode #22, entitled “Will Work For Dick” which originally aired May 4, 1997, Dick’s secretary Nina quits, and Dick hires Harry, whose poor skills become Dick’s source of frustration, while Nina tells Harry to fight back. Meanwhile, to advance her understanding of the human experience, Sally decides to attend a children’s ballet school to re-live the childhood she never had.

As usual, in the summary closing scene, they all are seated upon the roof to reflect upon the day’s events. In this episode Tommy, Harry and Sally are seated on the roof, while Dick joins them shortly.

Sally: Gyp - all I wanted was a normal childhood but Dick just couldn’t let me have one! I felt so humiliated.

Tommy: Hmm… I bet when you looked out into that audience and you didn’t see Dick there that you just felt like your heart was torn out.

Sally: Yeah.

Tommy: Yeah… and you felt betrayed and alone.

S: Uh huh.

T: …and you’ll never trust anyone ever again.

S: Exactly!

T: Yeah. Well, congratulations Sally! You’ve just taken your first step into childhood.

S: I have?

T: Yeah… and now you take all this emotional damage and let it feed your adult neuroses.

Harry: And the best part is that if you ever kill a guy or balloon up to 400 pounds, you get to blame Dick.

Dick: (off screen, and climbing onto the roof) Sally!! Sally… Sally! I am so sorry I missed your recital!

S: Yeah, you did. Umm, thanks, Dick.

Dick: What for?

S: Well, you’ve given the most precious gift of all…. emotional baggage. Thanks.

D: You’re welcome.

S: Now I gotta’ go eat.

D: I’m sorry Harry… I thought I didn’t need anyone. I thought I could do everything by myself. It turns out I was wrong. I do need someone… just not you.

H: Well, it takes a big man to admit that. And I guess it just goes to show you that you can’t work with your family.

T: But technically, we’re not a family. We’re more like coworkers.

D: Well… it goes to show you can’t work with your coworkers.

T: Isn’t that the motto of the Postal Service?

How ironic is it that within this humorous exchange we see the fallacy of blaming others and not accepting responsibility?

Birthed from pain, blame avoids responsibility. The fallacy that we are self-sufficient feeds failure. Yet  our natural tendency to avoid pain curiously drives us toward pain through avoidance of responsibility, which in turn feeds failure and absence.

It’s a vicious cycle. It’s a destructive cycle. But, it’s part and parcel of our shared human experience.

Calling honesty… come in honesty.

Is there anybody out there?

I had just purchased a fifth of Jack Daniel’s Old Number 7 whiskey. With 4% state sales tax and 2% county sales tax the total was $30.73.

In California, it was about half that, and I could buy it at any grocery store.

Hey! I’m helping support our “weak” economy!

I sent an e-mail to her.

I hope she replies.

I hope she doesn’t deny that she was there.

Hypocrisy sucks.

I like good whiskey and good tequila, which means I drink it straight… out of the bottle into the glass without ice or dilution.

And I love the LORD Jesus.

Yeah.

What’re you Baptists going to do with that?

For example, what do you say to someone you don’t know?

Alan Seig - WB5RMG, and I went to Scottsboro for the visitation with Dieter Schliemann’s - KX4Y widow and family. 

I only listened, nodded in agreement and said a few words of reinforcement when Alan spoke with Tina, Dieter’s widow.

When we moved on toward the children, for the briefest moment, the thought occurred to me that I was about to say something to the children and their spouses, and I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know any of them, having never met them.

I looked his son in the eye. His sorrow, pain and grief was obvious.

I reached out my hand to hold his, and opening my mouth, I said, “I didn’t know your dad as well as many others, such as Alan,” as I glanced over at my left, and nodded in acknowledgment where he stood by my side.

Continuing I said, “But from the moment I met him and the few opportunities we had together, I was impressed that he was a fine gentleman of the highest character. I will sorely miss him, and yet I know you will more.”

I really don’t remember very much more, except that I embraced his son tightly, and as I was close whispered, “God bless you all.”

His sister was standing next to him and as I moved next to her, she embraced me tightly as she wept, and I simply held her briefly, and shared the same sentiment.

I think that in death, we are not as sorrowful for the departed as perhaps we are for ourselves, because we will not have them any more.

We will not have them for ourselves.

That’s what human interaction is. That’s where God is found. He is among us in our actions through and toward one another.

And I think that to some extent, when we lose a loved one or friend to death, we sense that we have lost a part of the goodness of God that we saw and experienced in and through our interactions with them.

I know I will miss Dieter.

God bless your memory, and rest in peace, my friend.

Kevin L. Bardon, RN
KG4RCP

I thought it might be the brand of jewelry, a brand of guitar pick, or a memento from a concert she’d attended.

So I asked her, “whose guitar pick are you wearing?”

“Barlow Girl,” she replied, “it’s a Christian rock band.”

“Oh,” I said, “I see.”

She continued, “It says something about conformity on the other side.”

Immediately I said, “‘be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.’ That’s the first thing that comes to mind when I think about conformity.”

As I walked out in the parking lot, I started mumbling, trying to recall the remainder of the verse.

And it came to me.

As I was returning the baskart to the corral, another female shopper said to me, “sir, I’ll take that cart.” I had not heard her until she had walked a bit closer to me. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you,” I said as I handed the cart to her. I was looking at her face, and saw that she glanced at the left breast of my shirt.

I was wearing a pink polo style shirt which I had purchased when I worked at the VA Hospital in Fresno. On the right breast it read “Nursing Service.” On the left breast it was the logo for the hospital, which is a cluster of grapes at bottom with mountains in the background and in the center the VA logo is printed along with the words “Central California.”

“That you may prove what is that good, acceptable and perfect will of God,” I said as I walked back toward my Jeep.

It began to occur to me that actually PROVING the will of God is a thing that we can do by renewing our mind to His word. Our demonstration of His will can be made evident to us when we read His word. And when we read His word, our mind is changed, it is transformed. Thus the changing of our mind is in itself a type of evidence or proof of God’s will for us.

‘Amazing!,’ I thought. ‘Simply amazing!’

All this time, I’ve been wanting to figure out what God’s will is for my life. I’ve asked others to pray for me that God’s will be done in my life. And that’s true, because I do want His will in my life. And I’ve been wondering to some great extent, ‘what is God’s will for me?’

Strange.

Here I am nearing age 50, and I am asking some of the most (in my opinion) fundamental questions.

It certainly seems that I have at least one answer!

Thanks be to God!