Bang! Crash! Boom!

We have had some stormy weather this past week. This is storm season here around Queensland, most years we often get storms in the afternoons and sometimes they hang around for a week or so while the weather patterns waffle around. This week we have had some whoppers, but for some reason, our little house sitting area missed most of them. But on Wednesday night we got rain, it was wonderful to hear the rain, we stood out on the deck watching it coming down in buckets. It didn’t last long, but it was a good heavy shower that lasted maybe 30 minutes or so. The grass loved it.

Well, yesterday it was our turn. Late in the afternoon it started rolling up from the south east. A great wall of grey cloud.

 

Then came the rain and wind.

An hour later is was clear and we had a brilliant sunset.

The weather people in Australia are the Bureau of Meteorology. They have a very good website with radars that show all the weather coming, and it’s easy to see the storms brewing and moving across the country. Considering that generally weather forecasters are berated day and night, I reckon they do a pretty good job and are mostly accurate. And all through the storms, the planes come in, every minute or two and land at the Brisbane airport not far from here...



You can see the massive line of severe storms coming our way. You have to
look hard to see Brisbane City on this map...that is our area....

There is also a Facebook page called Higgins Storm Chasers. I follow them on Facebook if there are storms about too. They have some fabulous pictures sent in by all and sundry who keep up to date with this Facebook page.  Here are one or two of the pics from yesterday from Higgins Facebook page.

 

It's not so easy to see the refracted light in this pic, go to  his Facebook
page and see it....its amazing.

RARE* Rainbow with light refraction! This is only the second time in my life I have witnessed and captured the phenomenon... both times as the sun was setting behind me after a storm!

 How does this occur??? The change in speed that occurs when light passes from one medium to another is responsible for the bending of light, or refraction, that takes place at an interface, in the case water droplets or rain.
 Photo taken north of Canungra SEQLD this afternoon.

 Image © Jeff Higgins

You can see the refracted light better in this shot...amazing?  Yes!

 

 Poor Ellie, the dog here we are caring for is not happy when it is thundering. The storms we get here can be vicious, tropical type storms, with great flashes of forked lightning and massive cracks of thunder. Poor Ellie was sitting on Peters feet, her little heart going nineteen to the dozen. She will often head for the bedroom and hide under the bed.

 Anyway, we have had a couple of beaut storms, with some wonderful rain. Short sharp bursts, but enough to do some good.

You know, lightening is one of the most wonderful things ever created. I had a really bad fright when I was 14, when walking home with my best friend, we were standing on a corner when lightning hit the power lines above us, exploded the transformer beside us and all the power lines fell around us with lines spitting and sparking. The sound of the electrical transformer blowing up is impossible to describe, a boom like a bomb and the blue of the electricity exploding above us. It took me many years to get over that, and get used to storms again.

But I have been really fascinated by lightning, and know it serves a very important function in nature. Check out this video, showing blue lightning, red jets and sprites.

 

The video shows all kinds of lightning, even some from a planes cockpit.

It has taken scientists many years to work out just how lightning works, and they still don't know that much. But what they do know is that the lightning also goes above the clouds. We can't see that, but with satellite's they were able to study storms from above.

And one of the things they have found out is that it is lightning that keeps the electrical field around the earth topped up. For many years they wondered how the magnetic field around the earth kept its power without going flat. It seems to be a bit like a battery, and needs constant topping up. Apparently it is lightning that zaps up to the magnetic field and constantly feeds it electricity. Pretty good eh?

 

Droughts, fires and elastic in your knickers.

This website is driving me nuts, it's so slow!!!!! At least I can now upload images, but it's still like watching paint dry. How exciting!

Aussie is living up to its normal reputation as far as weather goes. The inside of the country is on fire, and the top end is flooding.

There are still many fires merrily burning away in the inside of the country, most of them contained or under control, and some just doing their thing if they are not impacting on people much. But up north, there is a cyclone. It has dumped lots of rain up round Cairns and Townsville, and is slowly working its way south. We have had one or two showers, and the ground has been very thankful, and the Bureau of Meteorology, or BOM as we call it, says the whole weather system is sliding down the  east coast and may get some heavy rain down our way in a few days. The ground is desperately in need of some rain, but this country doesn’t seem to understand moderation. If it rains, you get 5, 10, or 20 inches dumped on you over a few days, then nothing again for months. Oh well! At least we are not having the winter weather that the north is getting. Northern China, Russia, England and USA are all up to their eyeballs in snow.

I don’t know if you girls have the same problem I do, but trying to find knickers with decent elastic is becoming a problem. Either it gets all saggy after a little while and at the most inopportune times it slides down inside your jeans, and the legs go all baggy and horrible, or as has happened with me, the fabric goes nice and soft and the elastic will not soften at all. It’s like wearing strangulating rubber bands round the tops of your legs.

Elastic, tight, strong, well sewn, and the fabric will decay years before the elastic gets soggy.

 In frustration, I am chucking out all my knickers. I have a few pairs that I bought in China some years ago, they are so comfortable, but they really do look like old dusting cloths now. The problem is, it seems such a waste to spend heaps of money on stuff that no one sees! However, I was determined that this time comfort was to come before pocket, and I walked into the local Kmart planning to spend up to $100 on a whole new set of knickers.

Ahhh, much softer, and hopefully my legs won't feel like a lambs tail being docked.

Haha, I should have taken the time to look at them earlier. They have them there, three pairs for $8.00! And they have soft elastic around the legs! And the colours are quite pretty too! If you come round I’m happy enough for you to see them hanging on the clothes line. And they have cotton and elasticy fabric! So for the princely sum of $24 I have a new set of knickers. I think the tops of my legs will be very grateful.

You might think this is a rather personal and trite subject to write about, but I can tell you for sure, that if your knickers are not comfortable, then life takes a turn for the worst.

Supercell thunderstorm hits Brisbane.

We were warned yesterday that severe storm were likely today, and sure enough about 10 am the rumbling started. Looking at the Bureau of Meteorology site, we could see the massvie storm building west of Brisbane City. We use this site  often, because the radar is a very accurate means of checking what's going on. This article in the Courier Mail had some good pictures.






The storm didn't last too long, but was ferocious when it hit. They were forecasting large hail too, but that didn't eventuate. When the storms around here are severe, especially at this time of the year, it is not uncommon to get huge hail stones, from the size of a pea to the size of a tennis ball, and anything in between.

While the storm was doing its thing we had some visitors call in. Sue and Steve have been friends for over 35 years, and our families have grown up together. They also do house sitting. After our first few adventures, they thought they would give it a go, and they have had some good times house sitting. They have a caravan that is home in between times, and they travel a bit, so house sitting is not a constant thing with them. As it happens, both of us have had house sits close together several times. When we were on the Sunshine Coast, so were they. When we were in NSW, they were an hour away, so we visited from time to time.

I have just been on the BOM site again, and guess what, another line of storms is on the way. Not so big this time, but the sky is clouding over now, so I guess within the next hour or so, it will be crash boom bang again. I just wish we could get a decent bit of rain out of it. Brisbane had a terrific downpour today, but we are desperate for a bit of rain here.

I'm waiting with bated breath. . . . . . . . .