Never a Dull Moment!!

One minute I was enjoying a walk through the hospital halls with Grandpa and the next we returned to his room to hear my cell ringing. I picked it up to hear my brother encouraging me to head home as quickly as possible as there were terrible storms in the area and funnel clouds reported in cities not too far from us. The original plan had been for my brother Dave and his wife Trish and I to meet at the Marble Slab for ice cream about an hour later. If Dave and Trish were cancelling our ice cream date I knew this was serious! :o) Grandpa encouraged me to go to avoid the 'rain' (as all I'd told him was that there was quite a rain storm coming so as not to worry him about Grandma) and I made my way to the car.

Within moments of turning on the radio I quickly realized that just as Dave had said, this was no common storm!! The music radio stations had been preempted by weather stations and all were warning to take immediate cover and head to the basement as quickly as possible. Uh oh! I was still 20 mins from home. I called my parents as well as Sharon and Larry to make sure they had heard the news. We quickly decided that I'd head to Grandma's house and hang out with her in her basement so that she was not alone. All the time this is happening I'm realizing that Hannah day could be TOMORROW!! Was it really too much to ask the stork to fly through a tornado? Truly I don't think so!!

It was quite the storm I tell you! For the most part I enjoy a good thunderstorm but this wasn't normal. When the people at the radio station say this is the worst storm that they've ever encountered and are currently under their desks for safety, you know you're in for a doozie!! I was now 10 mins from Grandma's, funnel clouds were reported less than 10kms away and oh yah...the Flip was rolling capturing my drive just in case anything exciting happened! :o)

Very quickly many areas lost power, the sky turned a dark, slightly brownish/green colour, rain came down in droves and I knew I had to get to Grandma quickly!

I arrived and joined her in the basement. She knew there was a storm but wasn't aware of the severity of it and I wasn't telling her! We shared a wonderful hour in the basement sharing stories, reading sale flyers from the newspaper via flashlight and basically just pretending nothing much was happening. The basement was really quite quiet and we didn't know the severity of the storm and it was a wonderful haven for us.

Once things rolled over we went upstairs and she decided it would be a good night to take Sharon up on her offer and spend the night there. We all felt better knowing she wouldn't be home alone without electricity. As she was packing for the night she commented, 'oh, those poor women in labour right now.' I jokingly tossed back...'That's me!!' THE CALL could come tomorrow and I had no power (along with 70,000 other homes), my cell was down to 2 bars and **GASP!!!** I had NO WAY to check Rumor Queen to find out the status of referrals!!! That was the worst part! Whatever was I going to do??

I took Grandma to Sharon and Larry's and they invited me to stay too. Why not? Let's make this a party! I ran home, grabbed a few things and hunkered down here for the night. Sleep was not to come easily as you can well imagine. All I could think about was how far would I have to drive in the wee hours of the morning for an Internet connection to get my RQ fix? Or, would it really be wrong to call M3 at 3:00am her time to ask her to check RQ for me??? Truly, I think not! Heh...thanks friend!!

As I'm pretty sure you've guessed by now, my alternate plans will not be needed as power came back on around 12:30am. Phew!! That was an answer to prayers for so many reasons!! Guess I can cancel my 'What if they cancel work tomorrow?'plans!! Oh well, it was fun to dream while it lasted.

So....
1. The cell is charging
2. 'THE CALL' list is in my purse, in the car, on my desk and often in my hands too
3. The 'Flip' is charged and ready to go
4. RQ is being refreshed at an alarming rate considering how many people are doing as they should...sleeping!!
5. My heart is being lifted in prayer for Hannah over and over
6. My mind is saying, 'Go to Bed!' and my body is saying, 'Yah, right! For what??' You're in labour chickie and your baby could quite possibly arrive later TODAY!!!

Who's up for an all-nighter???