This is not a Lake

I left the flooded Ohio River Valley to visit family in West Tennessee, near the flooded Mississippi River Valley.  Sometimes it's hard to comprehend all the destruction in the news from tornados and earthquakes around the world.  On a smaller scale, there is flooding in western Kentucky and Tennessee.  I know, because I drove through a lot of it.  This is not a lake. This is farmland.  Farmers should be planting their crops right now.  But they can't.  Water as far as the eye can see in some places.

I didn't realize how much wind damage Tennessee had. I saw lots and lots of huge trees snapped in half from the wind. Other trees just fell over, roots and all, partly from the wind, partly from soggy gound--or maybe from both.

But, as always, the trip had many up sides. Nothing is better for the soul than lots of laughs with family. We had a lot of fun trying to come up with our Royal Wedding Names (I saw it online somewhere--take your grandmother's first name or grandfather's if you are a male, then your first pet's name hyphenated with the street where you grew up. You know, something like "Dixie Pledge-VanHook". We moved a lot and had lots of pets we couldn't remember, so we had lots of options. None sounded very regal though!)

I would show you a picture of the most excellent catfish dinner from this retaurant out in the country--if I had not scarfed it down so fast, that is.
 

I took dozens of pictures of birds on my mom's deck, but rarely got any good ones in focus before the birds flew away.  At one point there were five of these indigo buntings on the deck at once.  They are the sweetest little birds and such a beautiful blue.

So, after driving in horrible rain all day and getting drenched when I stopped for gas, I'm ready to snuggle up in my jammies and take a snooze! 

P.S. - Those of you familiar with Land Between the Lakes?  Lots of "lakes", not much "land" right now!