Hail Hail

After so many posts about Super Tuesday, here's a weather-related story.  This afternoon, I drove to my parents' house to pick up my mom for a doctor's appointment.  It had been raining heavily all day.  As I turned to the main street near their house, the skies opened up and down came the hail.  It was a torrential hail storm, which lasted about 10 minutes, and those were the scariest 10 minutes of my life. Seriously.  I was driving about 5 miles per hour, trying not to hit anyone, because I couldn't see anything. I didn't want to stop in the middle of the road, because I was afraid that someone might rear-end my car.  The force of the hail was so strong and so fast, I thought my windshield was going to crack into a million pieces.  The streets were like fast-moving rivers and I wasn't sure if my car would make it without flooding.  I eventually made it to my parents' house and picked up my mom.  I really debated with her about whether or not we should go.  We were yelling in the car, not out of anger, but because the hail was so loud that we couldn't hear each other. My mom lived in Thailand for the first 30 years of her life and has lived through incredible monsoons.  She said that she has never experienced anything like today's freak storm.  

I think this was the same storm system that caused all of the havoc and destruction in Arkansas and Tennessee.  My heart goes out to everyone who lost friends and family members tonight.