animale and I went grocery shopping this afternoon, and we got home literally minutes before a powerful thunderstorm hit.  There wasn't that much lightning, but the wind was really whipping around.  Winds were gusting to around 50 MPH.  We also got about 7/10ths of an inch of rain in under 15 minutes.  (This is after 5 inches of rain in 48 hours a couple days ago).  My weather radio kept going off every few minutes as Severe Thunderstorm Warnings spread across most of eastern Nebraska and western Iowa.

Shortly after the thunderstorm hit, the power went out and stayed out until about 9 pm.

What sucks about a power failure isn't the lights being out (I have flashlights and electric candles), no TV (I have a battery powered LCD TV), no radio (my Sirius boombox has battery backup) or no Internet (I have Web access on my cellphone if I get desperate).  What really sucks about a power failure is no air conditioning and no fans.  Especially when it's this hot and humid.

Ugh, tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter, with the heat index up around 111°F (44°C).

Even though I lived just a few miles from the Pacific Ocean in San Diego, it never really got all that humid there, not like it is here.  100°F when the humidity is 10% is very tolerable.  100°F when the humidity is 50 or 60% is downright oppressive.