The Covid Thunderstorm

This year, like every year, my lawn has gone feral. No worries, this happens at the beginning of every summer. Once the soil gets drier, the grass will slow down and I’ll catch up.  (I’m happiest when the grass goes dormant or just plain dies.)

The weather hasn’t cooperated with mowing. It kept raining and it’s a mess if you mow wet grass. I waited for a sunny afternoon and indeed one came. It was the kind of glorious day you’d die for in January! I had plans to fire up my tractor in late afternoon. I wouldn’t get my lawn all mowed at once before dark (it’s a big lawn) but at least I’d get a start.

A text came in. Mrs. Curmudgeon was warning me a storm was coming. I glanced out the window. It looked glorious! WTF?

I checked the internet and indeed my county was under a storm warning. The warning was impressive! It included, among various dire predictions, 3″ hail, strong winds, a deluge of rain; damage to buildings, roofs, and cars was imminent. It sounded serious!

Mrs. Curmudgeon’s phone and the internet agreed; all hell was going to break loose!

It felt off. I stepped outside and examined the horizon. It was clear as a bell. Not a cloud in sight. WTF?

I busied myself “battening down the hatches”. I don’t have a garage that’ll fit my truck. 3″ hail is the size of a fucking baseball and would surely curbstomp the body. Should I just bail? I could book it in a direction 90 degrees off the approach path? Alas, the storm warning was pretty wide. Maybe that wouldn’t work.

For a “hunker down” plan, I parked adjacent a couple of young healthy not too old and not too young pines. My thinking was that the young flexible limbs would break the fall of epic hail… not stopping projectiles but slowing them to “not-denting” speed. I hoped that the young trees would be more limber and more root firm; less likely to uproot in the anticipated winds. The tree selection thing was not easy because my choices suck. My land has mostly old decrepit trees that love to uproot in high winds.

Having stashed the truck as best I could, I was out of things to do. I stood there testing the air.

Now I’m not a meteorologist but I have what I’ll call “woodsmanship”. I humbly understand that radar and satellite imagery can see what a man on the ground cannot, but plain old common sense will go a long way. Hints at the local scale help one understand the atmosphere. Unless it’s an extreme cold front coming like a freight train in the dark of night, you can see what’s coming and have a good chance to react intelligently.

I observe basic weather stuff as you’d expect out of a person who’s generally in tune with nature. I’ll recognize a cumulous or cirrus cloud and know what each means. I know the way the wind generally blows in my area. I often know what to expect and when it’s likely to happen.

This warning just didn’t fit the world I was seeing. I looked at the leaves on the trees. I checked birds’ flights. I sniffed the humidity in the air. I scanned the skies in the direction from which the threat was supposed to come.

Something didn’t add up.

Without being able to put my finger on it, I knew (as well as one can know anything weather related) that the conditions were ripe for something bad but some key ingredient was missing. You need energy and you need the trigger to unleash it. The energy was there but not the component parts of the release. Whatever was going to happen was either not going to happen. Or maybe it would happen elsewhere. Or possibly it was busy tearing up the county upwind of me (which I doubted because it inexplicably hadn’t sent indicators downstream).

There wasn’t a big thunderhead to pull the hot humid air from low and shove it high into the cold atmosphere. There were gusty winds but not a solid developing front. The fucking birds were singing!

The thing about outside information is that it’s the voice of the media, not God. You’re a smart monkey. You can (and should!) compare reports to observation. The report didn’t look right for what I was seeing.

Rather than just standing in the glorious sun, I started mowing my lawn. I’d at least knock back some of the grass before it got wet again.

I got to work.

I recently added a radio to my tractor. I plan to post about the installation sometime. The intention was that I’d have NOAA weather updates while out plowing snow. I’m not a commercial plow guy but things could change. I could be one if I was desperate. I wanted a radio so I’m better equipped should I need to become one. I also need a flashing light so I don’t get creamed on the road. That’s not installed yet.

(Note: It is wise to have options during uncertainty. We’re in an economic house of cards and it’s collapsing around us right now in real time… as we always expected. There’s no point in wailing about our sad fate. We should adjust as well as we can and then roll with it. Snow removal equipment is much a “prepper” tool as anything. I’ll take it over another pile of ammo or yet another stack of MREs. Yes I have ammo and food, but beyond a certain point you should branch out. Shopping is not preparation. Realistic scenarios include things like snowplows and road conditions. It’s not going to stop snowing in winter. Do you need another 40 loaded magazines before you get a spare shovel?)

I started mowing in the glorious sunny weather. The local FM rock station is crap and the AM antenna wasn’t great. I settled on classic music.

I humbly assumed the storm would arrive eventually. When or if the mystery weather front actually arrived I’d hustle to the barn asap. I’d get soaked running to the house but the tractor would be fine. Plus, it was nice to get some grass cut.

The radio had other ideas. I was chilling to violins and shit when they interrupted the music:

“NOAA weather reports that Curmudgeon’s county is about to get stomped by a storm. Reports are that it will be ‘Godzilla-like” and leave ‘smitherines’. We return you now to your sleepy old people music.”

I shut down the PTO (it’s a three point finish mower deck) and stepped off the tractor. Despite the engine’s racket, everything seemed peaceful. The air seemed reasonable, if a little “twitchy”.

I shrugged and continued mowing. To the south a few clouds had drifted in. My airspace remained clear.

Another announcement, this time read by hand by a guy who sounded terrified:

“A weather report for… um… Curmudgeon’s township. NOAA says everyone is going to die and there will be no stone left on top of another. Er… Well… NPR will miss our lost viewers.”

I stopped again and checked the sky. The clouds to the south were cumulonimbus. They certainly could develop into a shitstorm but they weren’t “done” yet. I assessed them to be still growing in height. Clearly weren’t yet releasing pent up energy. No lightning, no thunder, no hints of rain. They were plodding along my southern horizon like they were in no particular hurry. They didn’t seem to have a pent up front behind them. Skies over my head were still clear. I went back to mowing.

“We interrupt this sleepy music from whatever a philharmonic is to specifically warn ‘Curmudgeon’ that he’s going to get ass beaten. Hail, tornadoes, Poseidon’s own rainstorm, and probably a herd of rabid Chihuahuas wills trip the flesh from his bones. This is the end! This is not a drill! All you rural hicks deserve your fate as the deplorable rednecks you are!”

I tried to ignore it but ten minutes later another warning came. I found myself watching the gradual drifting cloud heads. They were not over me. They were not coming toward me. They simply weren’t doing anything at all. I’m betting on radar they looked like Satan’s ass crack but I didn’t see rotation and I didn’t see density and I didn’t think they were even ready to release raindrops.

With nothing unleashing from the impressive but inert situation, the logical thing to do was mow lawn and relax. The storm would come if it came, and it didn’t appear to be coming my way at all.

Another warning. And then another. Good grief!

I gave up. All the warnings were getting me jittery. It was as if the whole world was in a strange alternate universe of hailstones and destruction. Yet here I was in a sunshine filled heaven. WTF? I parked the tractor, carefully locking the door. It was as safe as anything on my rickety homestead.

I stood there, in the bright glorious sunshine, wondering what the fuck was happening. It was still sunny. Not a drop of rain had fallen. I watched a hummingbird flitting about. I saw vultures coasting high in the sky. One bird weighing almost nothing and the others very high in the atmosphere (which indicated it wasn’t particularly turbulent where they soared). What did the birds know that the radar didn’t?

I got another text from Mrs. Curmudgeon: “are you still standing”?

I texted back “I declare a WTF paradox! The weather report is just another Fauchi press conference, a lot of ‘potential this’ and ‘beware of that’. Dead bodies aren’t falling from the sky. It’s all crap!”

More texting: “You have a weird way of being reassuring.”

I keyed in my explanation: “It’s sunny and nice. I’m confused. If I didn’t have the radio I’d not give it a second thought. There are some clouds… another 50 miles travel and they might amount to something but they’re just… ” I paused, trying to describe “woodsman” weather knowledge. It didn’t translate.

I deleted my text and tried again: “It’s bullshit. Maybe somewhere is going to get hit but not here. Be careful driving home through not-here! Delay your trip if you can. But right here is fine. Ignore the fuckin’ eggheads!”

Being the ornery cuss I am, I popped out a lawn chair and sat there in my driveway; almost daring the storm to come and get me. Everyone was watching radar and listening to warnings. I was looking at the sky. I watched big clouds drift on the southern horizon, doing nothing in a very impressive manner; just as I expected them too. It did this for a long time. I ate dinner and still nothing had happened.

Eventually, the radio and Mrs. Curmudgeon’s phone quit sending us warnings of imminent doom. Not a drop of rain had fallen. Nobody apologized for their spastic false positive. (Nobody ever does.)

It feels like everything I hear from every source is hyperventilating all the time. I theorize the goal is to have us spastic and panicked. It’s bad for us to hear that crap.