Dang thunderstorms. . .

I was woken up at 4:15 this am by an enormous clap of thunder that set off about a dozen car alarms in the parking lot of my apartment complex. HA! For two seconds I almost typed "a thunderous clap of thunder" instead of enormous! That would have been pretty stupid, huh?

This storm meant business. I was sleeping with earplugs in and still woke up - it was that loud! Of course my eyes blinked awake and I wanted to just roll over and go back to sleep, but the clock on my bedside was flashing. The power had gone out at one point so now I had to reset my clock and reset my alarm for my normal 6:22 am, a mere two hours away.

Yeah, don't ask why I set it for 6:22. Seems like a pretty random number you say? Ok, fine I'll tell you my reason for it. My local Channel 3 News has "Traffic & Weather on the 3s" so I set my alarm for 6:22 so I can immediately flip on the TV and get the report at 6:23. By the time the report is over I am awake enough to get in the shower. Sufficiently oddball enough for you?

Now back to the thunderstorm. All this getting out of bed to find out the time to reset my alarm and then appeasing my curiosity by checking out the downpour by standing on our balcony and witnessing the consequential river of water running through the parking lot, all while flashes of lightning and more thunderous claps of thunder (ha!) occurred with frightening speed, meant that I had a hard time falling back to sleep.

Normally I love a good thunderstorm. But I love them in the afternoon, on a Saturday, when I can curl up on the couch with a book, The Sundays playing on the stereo (this is a rule: The Sundays must always be playing when it rains), and watch the raindrops fall outside the window. These middle of the night, wake me up, keep me up during my last two hours of sleep kind of thunderstorms just make me a sad panda and a grumpy girl all day.