Saturday, October 30, 2010

A little light reading,,,that lasted well over 5hrs!

It is only natural that shortly before Halloween I would come across a name to look up. Naturally I am fascinated with serial killers. I am into the lives of ancient royalty (since we all know that clearly they were messed up individuals). I find biographies to be like a drug. You get to find out someone's inner most secrets. You want more and more of it till you can get your fill. This name is no different. I've spent all night reading numerous websites till I wasn't able to really find a whole lot of new information. I have literally spent the entire night, well into the early hours of the morning, researching and writing this topic. I'm sure I'll have nightmares when I do go to sleep.

****In case you want the short version of this story, go here and watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CNTV8yoNRQ

So let me begin.


The Countess Elizabeth Bathory was born August 7th 1560 in the modern day Slovadkia. She was born of noble blood. Her name was well known through out the area. She grew up to be a highly educated young woman when most rulers were either illiterate (since it was usually the Monks who knew how to read and write) or could only speak one language. She managed to learn how to speak four languages which included her native language (which I would assume was a version of Hungarian), Latin, German and Greek. She was also interested in science and astronomy.

Although she was highly educated, she went through a lot of fits and violent outrages. At the age or four or five, she had epileptic seizures, which neurological disorders and psychotic behavior later in life. It is suspected, now, that she was bipolar. She was raised by her governess and because of that, she was never disciplined. She grew up to believe that she could do whatever she wanted and there would be no moral consequence to her actions. When she was 14, she became pregnant by a peasant. I never found out what happened to that pregnancy, or if this event was merely a rumor, but her parents married her off when she was 15 to disguise a conspiracy although some sites state she was married at an earlier age. Since most of the sites state she was married at 15, I will use the "majority rules" statement and use that age.

Elizabeth married Ferenc Nadasdy on May 8th, 1575 shortly before her 15th birthday. He was 26. (In other texts, it says that they were engaged when she was 11 and he was 16. It is hard to tell which text is correct.) Rather than take on his name, he allowed her to keep her name, something he took on himself because her name was of such nobility. He was a sadistic man, as some soldiers were during those times. Wars in the 16th century were very violent affairs and she picked up on his mannerisms. He was very harsh on the servants and even on to Elizabeth. She was introduced to a lot of his ways of punishment.  Ferenc was said to be one of the cruelest men of his time. He was described as being a savage man. He was often away on war or business for the first ten years of the marriage and she bore no children until he returned.

Her life there was supposed to be very boring. Being a bored teenage girl, she found things to peek her interest. Having grown up as a vindictive girl, she began to gather resources to feed her curiosity for the sinister arts.

It is rumored that Elizabeth dabbled in the occult and studied many forms of torture while her husband was away as well as when he had returned. Perhaps that was influenced by Aunt Klara who clearly was a bad influence. Her aunt was supposed to be bisexual and always had an abundance of women around for Elizabeth to toy around with at a young age. Since she often visited her aunt, I suppose her lesbianism occurred often. Rumors spread that she eloped with a dark stranger, said to be the devil himself, and disappeared for a short time. Her husband forgave her for her disappearance however she couldn't stand her mother-in-law. Although her mother-in-law is rarely mentioned, it is clear that she had a hatred for her.

While her husband was away, it was her job to provide health care. At first she was very much into women's rights. It was her duty to take in peasants and serfs as well as destitute women who were beaten and raped by Ottoman soldiers. She was also in charge of running the estate and about 17 villages. Those were immense responsibilities for a girl her age.  Eventually she stopped doing this and became in charge of disciplining the servants in ways that would be considered sadistic today. Because of her hatred for her mother-in-law, she rebelled by torturing her servants. It wasn't until ten years after the marriage that The Countess was able to have children. She had six, although two died early on. Even though she was cruel to people of lower class, she was a good and devoted mother, which wasn't unusual at that time since royalty treated immediate family, especially their own blood line, with the the utmost care.

It was around her 40th birthday (some sites say 43rd birthday) when things began to go south. Her husband died in battle and she was a widow. Elizabeth's mother-in-law was sent away and she no longer had anyone to report to. Her behavior began to change even more drastically. She was always known throughout her life for being one of the most beautiful women in the land and she was said to be extremely vain. She would change clothing six times a day and would spend hours a day looking at her reflection. She really didn't even care for her husband so she was planning on his replacement before he died. There wasn't any remorse when he did die of stab wounds in 1602. When she realized that she needed a new husband, she began to panic. It was then that she realized that her youth was escaping her. That was the time that she upped her antics and her behavior truly become deplorable and atrocious. Her dabbling in the occult increased.

Some of what I read said that what happened next lasted over twenty years but most of what I read says that it started in 1602 and didn't end until she was caught in 1610. What is known is that she was always cruel to her help. She always had young servant girls around her to remind her of youth and beauty. Whenever she would sit and think about her fading beauty, she would go into a rage and torture her young servants more than than she usually did. Elizabeth even went so far as to sew a girl's mouth shut because she spoke too much. Of course she wrote to her husband, while he was still alive, and complained about severe head and eye pain, which now could be interpreted as a migraine. Perhaps she sewn the girl's mouth shut because of her migraine pain (as if she didn't have enough problems).

Before her husband died,  she had a whip that her husband fashioned that had three metal claws on the end. It was designs with the thoughts of not only tearing the flesh of whoever it touched, but potentially damaging vital organs, causing the victim to surely die faster than a regular whip would. It was created to get information out of his enemies.Elizabeth's aunt, Klara, was said to have taught her the art of flagellation; whipping as a form of torture. As cruel as her husband was, he never used this device. He left it behind because it disgusted him so. However, she didn't find it so disgusting for she often used it whenever she was in one of her fits of rage. Rather than whipping her victims along the back and buttocks, she would whip them in the front so that she could see their faces cringe. She also had a cage that was called The Iron Virgin that was shaped in a womanly figure but had blades inside of it. These were just a few of the medieval torture devices she used.











 What you must keep in mind is that once her husband died, she ended up having four accomplices that helped her do all of these deeds. She did not do everything on her own. She also didn't come up with all these ideas on her own, although it seems as though she was to be held accountable for a large portion of  her actions.

The discovery of blood truly was by accident. When a servant pulled Elizabeth's hair too hard while brushing it, she smacked the girl and drew blood. When Elizabeth noticed a small amount of the girl's blood on her hand, she though that she saw her skin firm up. Within the castle were groups of witches, seers, alchemists and sorcerers that she housed to save them from being killed. She used their talents to benefit her. She felt that her youth and beauty was more important than ever to find a new husband and to secure her reign. With youth, she could regain political power and would have a husband to play into her vanity. Without both, she would lose her chance to be King and would lose the chance to have a lover forever. She went to one of the alchemists and presented the theory of using virginal blood to restore what she felt she was losing. In fear of what would happen, the alchemist agreed that it was a suitable solution. Perhaps this was when Elizabeth's mental state truly declined. I'm not sure what she saw but she believed that the blood of these young girls was restoring everything. Keep in mind that a most girls were married off around the age of 14 in those days. In order to get a virginal girl, I'd assume they were around the ages of 12-14.



The slow tortures and deaths of young girls increased in number. This is partly because The Countess began to have female lovers to influence her more than her aunt did. Elizabeth was said to have lost her humanity all together. She would hang girls and drain their blood till they died. The girls would be hung upside down with their ankles in chains. Their throats would be slit and the blood would drain into her tub so she could bathe in it while the blood was still warm, thickened, sticky state. If a girl had exceptional beauty, Elizabeth would not only drink the blood from a goblet but would attack the girl. She would bite chunks of skin off. Allegedly she became so enraged and so "dependent" on the blood that she would slit a young girl's throat and drink the blood from her neck as it ran out.

For a time, The Countess was giving the girls proper burials by a local Protestant minister. In fact, she went out of her way. Even when the minister threatened to stop, she made sure it happened. She ended up threatening him in order to stop him from spreading the news of what was going on within the palace because too many girls were coming to him dying of "mysterious causes." It didn't last long because the frenzy to quench her thirst for this rejuvenating blood caused her to eventually not care and dispose of the bodies in haphazard manners throughout the castle borders and countryside. 

After five years in 1609 (although some would argue it was 1607), the blood of the peasants weren't making as big of a difference as Elizabeth had liked. Influenced by a lover, she became convinced that they were of poor blood and she wanted blood more rich to satisfy her needs. She created a school that would cater to furthering the education of young socialites so that they could take the chance to gain political power if that chance presented itself. She took in 25 young girls....at a time. She continued with all of her rituals and became very careless. This is where it gets fuzzy. In some articles it was said that a girl managed to escape and reach the proper authorities. In others it is presented that Elizabeth dumped the blood drained bodies of four young girls. Some local peasants took the bodies to be identified and word spread to the Emperor, Matthias II, who then took matter into his own hands. Elizabeth never took into account that these girls had wealthy and powerful families. The weird thing is that no one was inclined to address all the peasant girls who disappeared and died because they weren't of any importance. Only the girls of proper families were discussed.The mystery of the missing girls was soon solved. The Castle Csejthe was raided on December 30th 1610.

Before the trial could commence, they found the missing girls. Some were thrown into the fireplace. Some had their hands burnt and breasts bitten off. Some didn't have eyes or arms. A few were still alive.They exhumed the bodies of 50 girls, many of them had many piercings and puncture wounds to drain the blood. The Emperor ordered a public trial of the Countess and all involved in 1610.

While Elizabeth was of noble blood and could not be executed, her followers were burned at the stake. Before that could happen, the women were ordered to have their fingers torn off by burning hot pinchers since it was their hands that were the instruments of torture. Word spread about the trial and it became a public spectacle. She was charged, but never convicted,  for the death of 80 definite girls, but also for the possible deaths of a total of over 600 girls. Supposedly what sealed her fate was the fact that she had a journal that listed the names of every single girl. From what I read, that journal is locked away in a state archive in Budapest and is unable to be translated due to the poor quality of handwriting, damage, the grotesque actions depicted and the age of the language. One thing that I discovered was said in this diary was if a girl didn't endure the tortures well and died too quickly, she was marked as being "too small".

Witnesses began to describe, in detail, what had happened during those years. Some 300 witnesses came forward. It was the girls who made the biggest difference. They announced that they were tortured for weeks and sometimes months. During the trial, a list of the tortures that were inflicted by Elizabeth and her followers included:
-severe beatings over extended periods of time
-burning or mutilation of hands, faces, and genitalia
-biting the flesh off the faces, arms and other bodily parts such as breasts
-freezing victims to death by pouring cold water over their naked bodies during the winter until the water hardened
-covering girls in honey and tying them outside to be nibbled on by bugs and stung by bees
-severe beatings, administered by Elizabeth herself, who reportedly beat girls about the face “till their bones broke”.
-applying red-hot irons to the soles of girls’ feet.
-mutilation of the face, hands and genitals, including cutting off or splitting open the fingers,
-sexual abuse of the most depraved nature
-placing oily rages between a girls legs and setting them on fire.
-mock “surgery”, including forcing one girl to strip a piece of flesh off her own arm.
abductions. If girls did not come willingly, they were beaten unconscious and carried to the castle.
-biting off their flesh, sometimes until they died. Bites were taken off the cheek, the shoulder, and any part where there were a lot of flesh. Witnesses report she would have male servants eat their flesh.
-stabbed with needles and scissors
-forcing girls into small cages filled with spikes, or tying them up to the walls in the dungeon.
-starvation.

She really did have political standing. She was in line to be the King of Hungary since her husband died and I didn't read of her ever marrying again. Her uncle was named to be the King of Poland.  Her family even provided two of the most important ruling princes.

Rather than being executed, which wasn't allowed due to her political status, she was ordered to "house arrest". She sentenced her to spend the rest of her years locked up inside a room. Some of what I read states that it was her room that was completely bricked over with a slot large enough to slide food in. Other say it was the dungeon that she used to torture her victims. She died four years later, at the age of 54, due to mysterious circumstances. They aren't sure the exact date she died because they found a plate of food was never eaten. She was discovered dead on August 21st 1614. Throughout the years she was imprisoned, it was said that she never uttered any words of remorse or regret.

I read numerous websites over the past five hours and will include the websites:
http://steffmetal.com/countess-elizabeth-bathory/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_B%C3%A1thory
http://articles.mibba.com/Biographies/3211/Serial-Killer-of-the-1600s-Elizabeth-Bathory
http://bathory.org/shyla.html
http://www.abacom.com/~jkrause/bathory.html
http://www.whataslacker.com/backdoor/elizabeth_bathory/

Friday, October 29, 2010

And people wonder why I hate when others know where I live!

I had a terrifying dream last night. Maybe it was this morning? Either way, it was the "longest" dream I've had in a while. Watching Supernatural had nothing to do with it because there wasn't anything paranormal about it at all. It was just one of those dreams that involved someone hunting me down.

My dream started out with myself in this dark room with three other girls. We were all captives and the guy kept himself pretty concealed but he was in the room with us. He sat closest to me and was cradling me. He was almost being very sweet with me but he explained that he was going to rape each one of us one by one and that when he was done with us, he was going to dispose of us. I knew that I was taken out of my home and was brought here, but I didn't remember this in my dream. He said it may or may not be in that order. He asked if there was anything I wanted since I was the first. He said he always gave his favorites the first go and that they had special privileges. I asked for three things: I asked for a condom, for aspirin and for ear plugs. He asked me why and I explained to him that I had a headache and a toothache (which wasn't true) and that was also why I wanted ear plugs. I didn't want to hear the other three scream because it would make my head pound. I also didn't want to hear them die. He said he was going to grant my wish but he made sure to see that we were all bound before he left the room.

I was loose but I hid that fact. When he closed the front door and walked towards the car, I started to untie myself and tried to get the others unbound. They were younger and too scared to go anywhere, so I said I would come back with the cops to rescue them. I ran. I don't even know which direction I ran to but I ran...

The next part of the dream was myself in hiding. I had a cop around me and he told me to duck in the bushes. He explained that there was a double inside a different house posing to be me with a fake family. Hints were given out in the community that I was having "dinner with my family for the holidays to celebrate my return home". The family was a decoy and they were all dressed with bullet-proof vests under their clothes and strapped with concealed weapons. The cop next to me had headphones on that were supposed to check the heartbeats of the people in the immediate area. The area was supposed to be almost abandoned. There wasn't anything out of the ordinary. The man who took me wasn't here, and I knew he wasn't here.

The next part of the dream was around a police station. I don't know why the cop and I were walking in a neighborhood but we were and I told him that the man wasn't going to be at the house. He was more composed than that. I said I knew he was going to search for me in a place where I felt safe. The cop stopped. It was then that he said he heard an abnormal heartbeat. He said that he had the machine honed in to the suspect's heartbeat and would only hear his if it became to pump differently, with adrenaline. He told me to run and he drew his gun. So we ran and he split up from me.

Here is where the dream gets fuzzy. I ran into these sparse bushes along the road. I crouched and ran in between those bushes and a chain link fence. I heard tires squeal and I heard a gun go off. It wasn't the cop's gun because it was too quiet. I ran into a yard that had these tall, extremely trimmed bushes that was almost like a maze. I was trying to disorientate my hunter and hide. I was looking for weak spots in the bush walls so go through the wall and escape. There were just too many branches so I continued to run and I kept hearing the man whisper my name as if he was right behind me. He kept whispering phrases, some of which I couldn't understand, and it seemed like he was whispering it right into my ear as I ran, which terrified me even more.

I tried to find some sort of public area, like a park or a mall, but rather than that public figure being where I knew it should be, I ended up being in this field where I was out in the open. I turned around hoping to get back into the neighborhood but saw that it was gone. Instead, the man was walking out of the brush into the opening of the field. He kept telling me not to be afraid, kept calling my name and holding his hand out but I was too afraid to take it because I could see his eyes.

Then I woke up to Daylan holding me and telling me not to be scared. How great.

See people don't understand why I don't like anyone knowing where I live. They wonder why I panic when I am home alone and hear a door shut outside the house, even in daylight. I've already had Daylan's family walk into my house because they have a key. The last time was about two weeks ago. I was asleep on the couch in a tshirt and underwear when his dad and step-mom walked into the house through the back door. When I lived in Florida in the apartment for two years, five people were inside my apartment. Period. The only people inside were Daylan, Vanessa, Gabriel, Case and Kaydee. The only ones who knew where I lived with my parents, Daylan's mom and step-dad, Nessa and Case. No one else knew. I was so paranoid because people would knock on my door early in the morning, like 3am, and no one would be there. Or people would pound on my door during the day and I had no idea who they were or what they wanted. It's only natural that I would have this dream.

I hate when people know where I live.

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Just a little jealous

I found out that one of my friends, Melissa, is pregnant today. I would say that it seems to be in the water. My friends are all popping up to be pregnant within a few months of each other. Of course that statement is ridiculous because I have close to 200 friends on Facebook. Most of the females are married so surely they will have babies. It doesn't mean that I won't be a little jealous from time to time.

Melissa has been married for two months. Part of me was hoping she wouldn't get pregnant immediately because I had such a hard time in my marriage. Four months into it and I was pregnant. It was true that I was trying, but I really should have thought about it deeper. I thought we were ready. We were old enough, Tom was in the Army, I was working and there weren't any reasons why it shouldn't work out. I don't even remember when but Tom wasn't in the Army anymore and we were working jobs that weren't paying a whole hell of a lot. Not to mention that the hormones had me a bit crazy. Things just got in the way and I left when Gabriel was three months old. My year anniversary was spent when I was 8 months pregnant.

Hopefully things will be different for Melissa. The stress of money and pregnancy won't get in the way. Family will stay where they need to be and not get overly involved like what happened to me. She will still be able to do things. They will be able to do things together. Babysitters won't be a problem. Scheduling won't be a problem. I can only hope that things will be far easier for her than they were for me.

With that said, I am jealous. She is pregnant. Gabriel's Aunt Jennie just entered her second trimester with her third child. It makes me wish that things were more stable for Daylan and I. I haven't been able to get a job for six months and we are living off of his pay. If we were paying for rent, we would be screwed. If I had a job, I would be actively planning our wedding. As it stands, we don't know when we will be married yet. We had a date for April 15th, but now we just aren't sure. I have to move back to Florida for a year and maybe we will just get married in Florida before I move back to Texas. Hearing about other people's pregnancies make me wish I didn't have my IUD in. Holding two newborns in the past two months really makes me wish I could do that all the time.

Part of that is guilt because Gabriel is still in Florida. Once I get there, I plan on making up for all the lost time I've been in Texas. I can do the relocation paperwork properly. Part of me wishes that I could have another child to start over with and be the mom (for both of them) I should have been the whole time. It isn't that I don't love Gabriel but I mentally haven't been as around as I should have been. I had too much help that I fell back on. I'm definitely hoping that when I am in Florida again that I can get everyone to understand that I need to do it on my own this time.

I understand that now is not a good time to be pregnant. It is the reason why I've had my IUD for almost three years. I am hoping that within another two to three more years I will be able to take this out and feel comfortable in the idea of having another baby. Hopefully two more within a close period of time. I just need to get myself to that place where this can happen. I also need to get myself married.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

What A Failure

Before I moved to Texas, I hated cooking. My ex husband made it seem like it was a mandatory thing to do and I always ended up having to cook for his friend. I wouldn't have had an issue with it, but his best friend was over every single night. Plus my ex never quite gave me the compliments that I wanted, so everything was half-assed. I made it healthy enough since I was pregnant, but I never tried to do anything spectacular.

After I moved to Texas, I actually wanted to cook. The original agreement was that Daylan would cook and I would do the dishes. Of course that never happened. I ended up being in charge of both. I did manage to find a few recipes online that I wanted to try, and before I knew it, I was beginning to like this whole 'Woman over the stove' thing. Most of what I made were chicken recipes, but I do have other recipes stored in my laptop with other types of meat. I just have yet to try them. The thing that mattered the most was that Daylan actually would compliment me on the dishes. They were creative and they tasted good. We rarely had left-overs, no matter how much I would cook.

Tonight I was wanting to do something completely made from scratch. I found three recipes I wanted to do and the one I was the most excited for was a stuffed ravioli with spinach and ricotta cheese. Everything would be made from scratch. The pasta, the filling, the sauce. I hadn't ever tried to do that before. I had never tried to make my own pasta. I thought it would be really neat. I was looking forward to it. The grocery bill was pretty high because everything I bought was completely healthy. It was what I needed for the three recipes, plus my basics.

Well, I began to make everything according to the recipe and never bothered to read it past the ingredients. I made the dough, which was a pain to make. It was messy and it got everywhere, including me. I can't tell you how many times I had to wash my hands. I made the mix. I even had to flatten the dough. The only problem is that the dough wouldn't stick to each other no matter how hard I pressed it together. The filling ended up not staying inside the pockets in the pasta. Yeah, like I said, it was a pain.

The whole process was an utter disaster! The recipe didn't say how long anything was supposed to boil in the water and then I had to pan fry it.Since when do you pan fry ravioli? It never said how long I was supposed to do that. It didn't say at what temperature everything was supposed to be. It also never mentioned that it would smoke my whole house up to do it in a pan. The ravioli ended up being hard. Not only that, but it was so bland! It didn't even look like the picture. The picture looked delicious and what I made clearly wasn't even close. I even added extra seasoning and it still tasted like....garbage. I was so angry! I literally cried. Even if I didn't cry from anger, I would have cried from the smoke. It was a good thing I didn't have smoke detectors in the house.

My cooking still isn't up to par with a chef, but it has always turned out to be pretty good. I knew the thing I really needed to work on was my food presentation. I was actually beginning to take pride in what I was cooking. This was the first meal that I was so disappointed with. It took about two hours from start to finish to get everything done and I was hoping that it would turn out well. I would rather something that only took half an hour to make to be horrible.

Needless to say, I should have taken a better look at the recipe but I also shouldn't have became so upset. I shouldn't have taken that one dish so personally but I was so invested in it. To top it off, it was a waste of money. A whole bag of spinach, a whole container of ricotta cheese, a pack of Parmesan cheese, a bunch of butter (to pan fry everything), 8 eggs and close to six cups of flour was wasted for something that went straight into the trash. Daylan even tried to eat it with Alfredo sauce, but the instant he saw me throw it all away, he quickly hopped on that bandwagon. Daylan is a human garbage disposal and even he couldn't eat it. That says a lot.

It took my watching Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium to actually feel better. Well, that and a post that my friend, Kristen, posted. It certainly was a cute movie. Gabriel will love it. I really should try to find that for him :).

Next time I want to try to make something similar, I will actually read the recipe more thoroughly to see if it even sounds right. I still want to try to make it, but I will do it at a different time. I will make sure it sounds like it will taste good. I don't want to go and waste  products for something that won't even be edible. God, what a waste!

Good Morning To Me!

Normally when I wake up, it is around 9 a.m. and my bedroom is still pretty dark. The sun hasn't peaked over the neighbor's trees. The vertical blinds are closed and the bathroom door, in the hallway, is usually opened a bit to block the sunlight coming from the living room. The tv is almost always going because we both need some sort of noise to distract us, especially me. Yesterday morning was a little different.

At first I really didn't think anything of it. It was darker than normal so I thought that maybe I woke up really early. It happens every morning. Around 5 a.m., I make my way to the restroom and don't wake back up till 9. I looked at the dvr and noticed that the time was correct, but the entire room was dark. A 30 Seconds To Mars music video was on tv to cheer me up, and then I heard the thunder. "Finally, we have rain!" is what went through my head and I posted on Facebook about how much I loved thunderstorms. I was just sitting up in bed watching the music video when the tv switched to the emergency broadcast system. There was a tornado warning in my county. Literally within two to three minutes, everything came together in a way that was not what I had expected.

Suddenly all I heard was the tornado siren blaring throughout my house.The airport is less than a five minute drive and there is a siren pretty close to me. I'm sure it would have been louder if the wind wasn't howling outside. I opened the front door, which is next to my bed, and found that the sky was a very dark grey, which is completely different for this area. There is rarely ever a cloud in the sky. In the six months I have lived here, I can count on one hand how many times it has rained. I also noticed there was some resistance in closing the door. You would think that the tornado warning on the tv would have been the first sign. So rather than be the smart person I usually am, I went to the room with the most windows to look out the back door. I couldn't even see the lake in my backyard. It was nothing but a cloud. It was almost like I had fog surrounding the house.

It was around that time when I suddenly got my bearings straight. I got some pants and shoes on, just in case, grabbed my phone and went to the room in the house that had the smallest window; the bathroom. It is also the only room in the house with a door. We have plenty of door frames,but no doors, besides the front and back door. Daylan called to tell me that the house is made out of cinder block and not to worry. Yeah, what a thing to tell someone that is practically waking up around that time.

The thing that really jolted me the most was hearing pebbles hit all the windows and the doors. It sounded like I was standing in a bedroom of a two story house to hear some teenage boy throwing pebbles at my window to get my attention. It was strong. The windows weren't just being tapped, they were being hit. I didn't even think that it could have possibly been hail because hail was not something I was accustomed to having lived in Florida for 19 years. I just thought that it was pebbles, which had to have meant that there was a tornado around but I didn't hear the freight train sound that people always announce. I love storms and I watch a lot of storm shows on tv. People always say they hear this howl. They said it is very distinctive. There wasn't a train sound but really that didn't help out a lot. All I kept hearing was the thunder. This wasn't the thunder that I am use to hearing. This thunder sounded like someone was shooting a shotgun outside my house. It was that loud and that sudden that it terrified me. I made one quick scream.

The smart girl in me would have stayed in the bathroom, but I was impatient. I had adrenaline coursing through me and I was alone. Daylan was at work and I was dealing with this by myself. I tried to call my friend in Illinois, Kristen, but only got her voice mail. When I get freaked out or I get nervous, I always try to call someone so that I can have someone to calm my nerves. This morning I was alone. Daylan didn't have time to stay on the phone when he called. He just wanted to tell me not to panic and had to get back to work. Boy, some company would have been helpful.

The whole ordeal only lasted about five to seven minutes till the siren went off and the tapping of the windows disappeared. The big warning signs were gone, so I made my way to the back door. The lake was still a gray haze, but I could at least see more than just the border of the water. That was a little big more comforting. It was simply a sign that things were going to get better.

It took about half an hour for the thunder to not be as loud and several more hours till the thunder went away completely. Now it was just a thunderstorm. The rain wasn't nearly so heavy and the lake was completely visible now. Part of me wondered just how much rainfall we got and wondered if it would last longer. Unfortunately the rain seemed to absorb into the ground as quickly as it fell. I was just thankful that the imminent threat was gone. Now all I needed was for it to brighten up just a bit. I actually had to turn a light on. Thank goodness I still had power amidst all of this or I would have been more scared than I was.

The rest of the day was crystal clear. Around 1pm the sun was shining bright and it was like the storm never happened. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and my yard was barely wet. Apparently the other side of town wasn't so lucky.

The Concho River flooded, which is a normal occurrence. This area really doesn't fair well with even minor rain and the river floods with inch of water that hits the ground. Around 200 people were without power and a few people had to have water rescues. Lightning struck three times, one of which was almost a possible fire. Supposedly a tornado did touch down in Wall, TX which is 13 miles away but I can't seem to find any proof of it online. Yeah, 13 miles away from my house is close enough.