You know the saying “If you don’t like the weather in {Insert your state here}, just wait a few minutes!” In the last two days, and possibly much of January, truer words could not be said about the weather here in Tennessee. Gray skies have been intermittent with occasional sun. The temperatures have been warm, rainy, and much more like March than January. Of course the first 10 days of January were nearly record cold temperatures which flirted with the 20s for highs and in the 10’s for lows. 
The last two days have also been very rainy. Yesterday we received almost 2 inches of precipitation which caused some localized flooding – like in my backyard! The stand of trees in the center of the picture is centered on our boundary. Which means that most of the flooding is actually in my neighbor’s yard but the stream on the right side of the trees is rushing through our back yard. It’s causing an erosion issue in the back corner of the yard that I hope to deal with this summer.In a break from the rain I tinkered in the greenhouse and changed a lock on the front door. When I first went out the weather was warm with no rain. While I was working a chorus of rain began with an accompaniment of thunder and lightning. I went hastily (that means I ran at a fast yet masculinely casual pace) inside to wait out the rain and fully expected it to last awhile. Twenty minutes later the rain stopped, the sun peaked out, and azure blue skies emerged. My oldest daughter even said “Look daddy the pretty clouds are back.” That didn’t last though.
The strange weather shifted tonight to hail and tornado warnings in our area. I’m not sure if there were any touchdowns or any damage but I can say that lightning, hail, power outages (albeit temporary), and television tornado warnings do make for a chaotic evening. But here in Tennessee all I have to do is a wait a few minutes … right?