Rainbow hunting

After this afternoon's thunderstorm, Daru and I went hunting for a rainbow. The sun was shining, the rain was falling, and there was no rainbow to be found.

Are you a Rebel or a Yankee?

This is an interesting quiz about your speech patterns. My brother-in-law heard about it on NPR and my sister sent it to us. My dad who grew up in West Virginia was the least Dixie in his speech and my mom who grew up in Arizona and Pennsylvania was the most. It has a lot of interesting information on how language is different across the US. Doug and I were both 40% Dixie (although our answers were different), so we are definitely Yankees. Let us know how you do.

http://www.alphadictionary.com/articles/yankeetest.html

It's summer!

Last summer, Daru did not like watermelon. She has changed her mind this year and she enjoyed eating this piece of our first full watermelon of the summer.

  

The Big One

After we moved to Charleston, we learned several key facts that one might want to know before settling in an area. We knew we were moving into hurricane territory. The last major hurricane hit Charleston on 1989 (Hugo). According to lots of people, the big one is coming soon. Some people feel that hurricanes cycle on about a 10-15 year cycle. One year the hurricanes hit FL, then the Gulf Coast, then the Atlantic coast is due for a big one. The first hurricane season we were here (June 1- November 30 for those of you who are not privileged to live in a hurricane area) we had a Category 1 pass through our area, but that year the majority hit FL. Last year obviously the major storms hit the Gulf Coast. Alberto just passed through as a tropical depression (technically he loses his name for that- the storm previously known as Alberto I guess is what we call it now) The big one is coming....
What I did not know about hurricanes is that they also spawn tornadoes. You probably remember doing tornado drills in school where you went in the hallway and knelt on the floor with your head towards the wall and covered your neck with your hands. I remember these drills as uncomfortable for the 3 minutes we usually had to practice. Last year, we had a tornado touch down within a couple miles of my school and my room had no windows so I had 3 classes worth of kids in there against the wall and under the lab tables. There have been several other tornadoes in the area as well, but nothing huge. Not many talk of the big one coming I guess because the tornadoes are overshadowed by other natural disasters.
Charleston is also apparently on a fault line. I guess real estate agents and travel books don't find this to be necessary wisdom to impart on prospective buyers and visitors. In 1886, an earthquake took out 7/8 of the city causing $6M of damage (in 1886 dollars). The earthquake is estimated to have been between 6.6 and 7.3 on the Richter scale. There has been at least one tremor since we have been here, a little shake of the magnitude of 3-4. Some people feel that major quakes occur about every hundred years. We are about 20 years overdue for our big one...
If you would like to know other reasons to live in Charleston, you probably should not talk to me...it is a nice place to visit, so y'all come on down, ya hear?

Thanks to www.weather.com for the Doppler radar pic and wikipedia for the Charleston earthquake info.

Jellies

A few weeks ago our friend Elwood took us on a tour of the Charleston area to see the things we would never see since we are practically tourists. At the beach we saw lots of jelly fish. This was not taken at the beach obviously, but at the SC aquarium, but I think it is the same kind.

  

Inspired by Andrew

Andrew has posted 2 peahen pictures in the past couple days, and he inspired me to search for my favorite peahen picture that I have taken. Though this is not a white peahen or perhaps it is not as artistic as Andrew's, I like it. This was taken last July at the petting zoo at Magnolia Plantation. I also have a picture of a white one, but it is not so great.