At least there's some sunshine...

Yesterday morning, I woke up around 6 or so, to a steady, hard rain.

I smiled to myself, thinking that when I ran, it would have to either be at Lamar on the treadmill or later that night. So no real need to get up early.

I snuggled back under the covers. Russ got up -- the plant where he works has been having a few minor issues and he's been monitoring things from home -- and shut our bedroom door. I dozed in and out for an hour.

I was half-awake in bed, trying to decide whether to get up or stay in bed when I heard the loudest noise ever, and the house shook a bit.

I jumped out of bed, made it through the hallway in two steps, and got into the kitchen, to see

A HUGE tree collapsed in our back yard.

Yeah.

There was a cluster of trees in the very back of our back yard -- two oaks and a Sweet Gum tree. They survived Hurricane Rita. They survived Hurricane Ike.

But the recent pouring-out of rain onto my area proved too much for the Sweet Gum. The ground apparently got so saturated that the tree just...fell. It wasn't dead -- you can see the green buds that had started forming in anticipation of springtime.

It just fell.

Parts of it fell onto our screened-in porch, but the most damage was done to the weather head on the back corner of our house. It completely broke. We still had electricity, though.

Entergy came out because it had landed on an electrical line. The utility lineman told us that he was technically supposed to cut power to our house, period, but since we still had electricity he wasn't going to mess with it. But, he said, if our lights started blinking or dimming, we needed to call them back out to cut it.

Three hours later, that's what we had to do.

We are so lucky that we live in the same town as both sets of our parents. We're currently staying with my in-laws until we can get it fixed (hopefully by Tuesday). So at least we don't have to stay in a hotel or in a house without electricity.

But I don't have to tell you how much this has thrown me off of my game. I am married to my routine, and any slight variation throws me into a tizzy...

I didn't run yesterday at all.

When I got up this morning, I didn't have my oatmeal or my strawberries or my almond butter. (I did have coffee, thank goodness.)

I was determined to run, though. Determined. I forgot my running shoes at our house, so I drove over there to get them. And then I ran six miles around my in-laws' neighborhood.

Again, running in an unfamiliar place bothered me, but I was determined.

And I got some sunshine as my reward.