Wednesday, February 6 - Update

Seven people died in Kentucky with this latest round of killer tornadoes. A family of three near Central City (where the Everly Brothers are from) and another four in Allen County, southeast of Bowling Green. Barry just told me that now 50 people have died in all -- mostly in Tennessee. Thoughts and prayers go out to all.

There was extensive damage in Harrodsburg, only 30 miles north of here, but NO injuries (see the link to the Danville Advocate-Messenger below). Elizabethtown was without power this morning and the county schools are closed for the rest of the week -- evidently the Central Hardin County High School was directly hit.

After we finally got to bed about 2:30, there actually was another tornado warning for the southern part of Casey County, about 4:30 this morning, but it didn't affect us. All we got was a bit of wind and a few periods of heavy rain. Barry hears the rain more than I do because the bathroom off his bedroom has a skylight that just amplifies the sound, plus I'm more of a sound sleeper anyway. I probably wouldn't have heard the tornado sirens! We WILL hear them in over in Alum Springs because they're only a mile down the road!

At 1 AM, we were standing outside on the front porch watching the lightning over towards Louisville (about 50 miles northwest of us), and over Stanford (about 6 miles east as the crow flies). The temps were in the low 60's -- which would have been a comfortable evening in August back home in Maine. And that was precisely the problem -- that much warmth, combined with moisture off the Gulf of Mexico, and a strong cold front to our west, caused all the trouble.

We still have a high wind warning here for up to 60 MPH gusts, and it is a bit breezy but nothing unusual yet. As I look out the window I see a mixture of bright blue sky, sun, dark gray and bright white clouds. You can read the news of the storms throughout Kentucky at The Lexington Herald-Leader, or in our area in The Danville Advocate-Messenger, our local paper.

In the meantime, we're still waiting to get started moving. We've packed about everything we can, and are living out of boxes and bags now. The people from whom we're buying have until Feb 18 to move, but we're still hoping to get a call from them soon saying that they are out and we can begin moving in -- IF we can get out of here with the nearly-washed-out culvert at the end of our driveway. Since we're now renting, it's still the landlady's responsibility to keep the drive open, but if she doesn't, there may not be much we can do other than withhold rent money, which still wouldn't get the culvert repaired. Barry is losing sleep worrying about the whole issue -- it's really complicated -- but I think it will work out. Trouble is we won't have much time to wait ... we'll see.