summer rains

Used to be in Arizona, that many days from mid July to early September, we got thunderstorms in the evening and nightime. In the recent past, the reason we hear on the news is that we have a 'concrete island'. The moisture hits our city heat and just either goes around us or disapates. I guess the weather didnt' get that memo last night. About the time I was going to get in bed (happens that was ALOT!), I start hearing the rumble. I usually take the dogs out one more time before I climb into bed. When I did, I could smell the moisture and see a few flashes. We went to the bedroom, but were not there very long when Rally (my most nervous of the rainstorms) started to panic. I had already outfitted them with their Thundershirts, but THIS storm was going to pass right over us. Some how that crafty dog KNOWS. He even will look at the flickering TV...and then pad over to the glass block to see if the flashes are OUTSIDE. Its hard to live with a husband who is smarter than you are, a son who is smarter than BOTH of his parents AND a dog that is so intelligent! He can open doors and will come 'get' me when he finds a ball he cannot rescue. I think he is related to:

This dog from the Travelers Insurance commercial. He looks JUST like him (altho at the moment, Rally is sporting some sort of dread lock on his head...cause his mom is too lazy to take him to be groomed. The groomer yells at me....HEY..he is a SCRUFFY dog! )

Anyway, I took them out once more, and THIS time it was VERY dusty (seen those huge dust storms on TV? The ones my mom panics about and calls me on the phone to see if I am ok? Itsn't that sweet? but..ok..its DUST.. off we go to ride out the storm. About 1am, I figure I am safe...I trundle all the dogs back to my bedroom. I can still hear a bit of rumbling, but no dogs try to climb on the bed and into my body. I"m thinking those Thundershirts are doing SOMETHING...

And when I wake up? I see THIS:

and THIS:

Guess we had a bigger storm than I thought!