Monday 3 December 2007

Serious thunderstorm

In a fit of madness, I took some walking clothes into work today and caught a bus to Drummoyne instead of my regular Five Wog conveyance. I hopped out at the Iron Cove bridge and walked around The Bay.

A serious storm cell was blasting away on the opposite side to me - over towards Gladesville. The cell was zooming across in front of me from right to left - over on the left was clear blue sky, whilst just a few kilometres over the other way was sheets of lighting and thunder and all the other things that Thor does when he has a hangover.

That area is normally under the flightpath from Sydney airport, but I was watching planes doing some serious banking after taking off in order to go around the storm. When you can see all four engines on a Jumbo from side on, you know that it is banking pretty hard. They did not want to go through that storm.

Neither did I really, but it was a race between me on foot and the rain across The Bay.

The rain won.



I was about 1km from home when it started drizzling down. I was waiting for it to start pelting down monsoon-style, but it must have been a wimpy storm - all bark and no bite. That yellow blob in the middle of the screen was me.

The lightning was a complete classic though. You know how a lot of lightning is just "zz" and then BLAM!? Well, this stuff was on repeat. A strike would go "zzzz-zzzzzz-zzz-z--z---zzzz" for at least a second or more. It wasn't a brief flash in the pan. Haven't seen anything like that for a long time.

I did make a simple promise to myself to buy a new pair of Crocs. I have walked mine into the ground. Or, more correctly, I have walked mine until I can feel the ground through what is left of the sole. That might be fine for a shoe that is used in rock climbing, but it is not much chop for walking over broken rock and glass.

My legs are killing me now though. I used to walk up to 100km a week not that long ago, but I have gotten out of the habit in the last year or so. I only walked 4-5 km tonight, and I was only strolling and I feel like I have been hiking for days. Amazing how quickly your muscles can forget.

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