Tornado/Mice
The tornadoes last weekend scared the crap out of me! We had like 3 in our area and there were a bunch more that hit all over Texas and Arkansas the same day.
I had already gone to bed. I wasn't worried because the weatherman who kept interrupting my shows was talking about Arkansas and it wasn't even raining here. We went to bed around 9:45 and right as I was drifing off I heard it thunder and I think I saw lighting.
Apparently a bit later the phone woke me up and it was like 10:30. It scared me because no on calls that late, and right after it woke me up and I had rolled over to see the clock, the power went out. Well when that happens I can't answer the phone so I got up to get my cell phone because I figured it was my mom.
By the time I dragged myself out of bed half asleep and got to my cell phone she had hung up. So then I am trying to call her and she answers and says, "A tornado is hitting Barksdale Air Force base right now...take cover!!" Well I freak out and still am not awake and I wake Pat up and tell him and he just lays there. So I run to the window and wind is blowing like crazy. I start pulling stuff out of the closet so we can get in it as that is the only place in the whole house that isn't directly on an outside wall.
So Pat is just laying there and pissing me off. I keep running to the window and waiting to hear a train noise because that is what everyone says they sound like. He is just laying there not taking it seriously. There was no time to gather up all my critters. I could just see them flying out of the house but what could I do? I didn't get in the closet because I didn't want to get in there without Pat but if I heard a train noise I was going to scoop Wolf up and jump inside.
About 5 minutes later my mom calls to say it is gone and heading to Haughton and I ran to the window and it was DEAD still. All that wind was from the tornado hitting. It hit right near our house. If you just drive a little to get out of the neighborhood, it was right at the entrance of Barksdale Air Force Base, which the base is right down the street from us. The next few days you couldn't even drive that way. It was blocked off because there were trees all in the road.
On Clyde Fant Parkway at the park area there were trees all over the place. You know when you are a kid and you were sitting on the ground and you would pull the grass up by the roots? That is what these trees looked like. It looked like someone just reached down and pulled them out of the ground by their roots. There were houses down from the base a little that had their rooves blown off. Crazy stuff!!
I told Pat the next time he could just blow away, that I was getting in the closet with or without him. UGH! I mean what part of a tornado is hitting RIGHT BY OUR HOUSE do you NOT understand? He still thought when it was all over that it wasn't a big deal. I don't understand him sometimes.
Our electricity was off for 13 hours which is less that I thought it would be. I didn't sleep at all that night because I was scared another one was going to come and it was so hot in the house without air.
In other news this girl at work walked up to me today and asked me if I wanted her mice. I heard her talking about them one day so I had asked her about them. She is not the best owner with some of the things she says about her animals. She is kind of a different person. I don't think she is maybe quite right. I can't put my finger on it. She had asked me the other day about keeping the smell down and such so we talked some. Someone I think her siser or brother gave them to her because they didn't want them.
So today she came up to me and asked me if I wanted them. I really didn't only because I really don't have time for any more animals, but I have always wanted fancy mice. First I told her let me think about it because I couldn't even think of a place to put them in my house.
Then she keep talking and saying how her mother was sick of them and she was about to let them loose in a field!!!??? I said oh no don't do that. And then she goes on to say how she left them outside today. I said, well I hope you left them in the shade and she said yes...whew. Still a bit hot today for two little mice but I think ok in the shade.
So all I could think of was her mother letting these poor mice out in a field somewhere and them starving to death and I told her like 30 minutes later I would take them.
So I ask her where she lives and she lives in Benton which is a good little drive. So I am trying to figure out in my head how I will get them from her without having to drive to her house and she says, "I can leave them in my car tomorrow with the windows down." Uh NOOOOOOO. They will still get to hot in a car with the SUN BEAMING DOWN ON IT even with the windows down! So I asked if she could throw a towel over the cage to sneak them in and I would take them home at lunch. She said she had a travel cage so I told her to put them in there and bring them inside, and at lunch time I would go get everything out of her car and take them home.
I mean really I don't understand people.
I am not looking forward to another cage to clean and I know Pat is not going to be happy so I am not even telling him because he will say no. I mean it's all free though so come on?