Storms, stress and calm, all rolled ito one

We're having a stormy night here. It has been overcast and drizzly off and on all day, with a few short periods of rain. In fact, when I ran an errand around 4:00, the sky was all covered except for this one little spot of blue. See the little patch just above the tree branches?

Then around 5:00, it broke loose! I was still at work, as this is my late night, and it poured! I could barely see across the parking lot, which is very small, holding just 10-12 cars. I'm guessing visibility was about 25 feet for a while. Unbelievable!

No one showed up for my group, and with the rain continuing steadily, although not as blinding as I described above, I knew why. I left early, and as I was driving home, I was captivated by the fog in the valleys between peaks.

There are mountains behind those clouds/fog.

This is extremely blurry, but you can see how low and thick the clouds are.

This shot is close to home. There is fog in almost every valley. It was so pretty!

Kind of a long range picture. There is another ridge of mountains behind that bank of clouds.

I'm almost home. That is my roof between the two power lines.

Since I got home, it hasn't rained very hard, but it has been pretty steady. I'm very glad it is; the pines are stressed, especially the gorgeous Ponderosa pines. We've had rain off and on for the last couple months. Some of it has been hard and did a lot of good, but there was too much damage caused by the drought. We need more. So, yes, it is good to be having this good soaking rain. I'm enjoying the pitter-patter and the occasional thunder, with a cup of tea and my pups.

Even Jazi seems to be less worried about the thunder than usual. When I got home, she was glad to see me, but wasn't a quivering bowl of Jell-o like usual. Maybe she's getting over her fear? Well, I'm not holding my breath, but I'm hoping so.

I have SO much to do before I leave on Friday. I will get it done, but the thought of it all is not fun. It doesn't help when I do things that cause myself extra work. I had to go to the bank to get a replacement debit card this morning, and the 45 minutes or so could have been used otherwise. A few days ago I got a new credit card, so I activated it, then took the old one to the shredder. I didn't realize for several days that what I shredded was not the old credit card, but my ATM card! Duh! Oh, well, I'll get to Albuquerque, on the plan and to Denver some way or another, and it will all be good!

Then another hitch in my time .... this morning I had to replace several batteries in devices around the house. Some shouldn't have needed it, as they were replaced not that long ago, but they did. A friend at work told me there was a huge solar flare, and that could have done it. Whatever, it took me about an hour to replace all of them. Good grief!

I'm feeling very peaceful tonight. Thank goodness! And I've decided to take advantage of the calm in my heart to chill for a while. The packing and cleaning will get done. Or not!!