Rigors of Fall

Last night, up here on the Sunshine Coast, we got a sudden rain and windstorm that was as fierce as anything I've been through and very brief.  Torrents of rain, terrific winds for about 20 minutes.  Lights were flashing on and off as the power lines tried to figure out whether they were going to bear up.  Eventually, they decided, 'Not!' and about 10 pm we lost power for 14 hours, although our next door neighbor's lines held up.  (They're on a different grouping.)

During the storm, our living room (on a 2-story, log house with a cathedral ceiling and a metal roof) sounded like The 1812 Overture, played only on percussion instruments.  Objects were crashing down on the roof constantly and it really felt that any minute they would come right through the roof.

And, then everything frenetic stopped, and a nearly full moon appeared and everything outside, because it was very dark otherwise, was bathed in the silvery glow of the moon.  For a moment, I thought it had snowed, too, during that intense 1/3 of an hour.

And this morning, the yard was not strewn with big branches that had crashed down upon us.  A few small pieces, but little in quantity and size.  So I don't know what that was all about.  Walpurgisnacht, maybe?  A little late, though.