Rain. Real rain.

Thunder started booming at about three o'clock this morning..... not those rolling freight-train-warning thunder sounds, but sonic-boom sort of sounds that made us jump up out of the bed. Having not heard thunder for almost a year, those loud sounds in the middle of the night sounded like the world was coming to an end.

Within minutes of the first boom of thunder, the rain starting beating against the house. Not a soft drizzling rain that has teased us every three months or so, but a real rain that you could hear crashing against the house and pouring down the rain gutters. Honest-to-goodness, someone-up-there-is-opening-the-clouds rain.

We both went downstairs...... I checked on the birds and the cats, and my husband made himself a cup of coffee (at 3:00 in the morning?) and then he went outside on the porch (at 3:00 in the morning? in the dark?) to watch the storm. (I don't sit on the porch in the dark.... who knows what could be crawling or slithering out there in the moonlight.)

Thankfully, Gatsby came inside last night when I asked him to..... he came in and sat in his favorite chair in the TV room and went to sleep. That cat would have been scared down to his whiskers if he had been outside on the porch when that thunder hit. As it was, when I went into the TV room to see if the cats were okay, Gatsby was under the sofa, Mickey was curled up on his pillow, and Sweet Pea was sitting by the window watching the lightning off in the distance.

My husband sat outside and watched the lightning, listened to the thunder and the rain, and said the best smell in the world was that of wet earth. (We're having homemade pizza for dinner tonight-- he'll be changing his mind about that wet-earth thing.)

The parakeets were huddled up in their cage, feathers touching, heads tucked into the back of their necks.... I'm sure they weren't thrilled with the early-morning weather interruption of their quiet night's sleep, but they didn't seem to be stressed out by the noise. We have a quiet house here unless we're hosting a party..... whatever pets come into this home quickly get used to peace and quiet.

At four o'clock, my husband was still out on the porch..... I looked at the clock and knew I had to be up and awake in less than two hours for the morning walk with J & J........ back upstairs I went.... but couldn't sleep because of the loud rain and even louder thunder. Out came the Halloween magazines, and I got another game idea for next month's Halloween party. I love all those Autumn issues I've saved over the years... no matter how many times I page through the articles, I can always find something new in them.

The sun came up a little later than usual this morning..... the rain cooled down the temperatures some, which made the walk very comfortable. Before mid-morning, back up went the thermometer..... it's still Summer in central Texas..... but we have had rain. Rain. RAIN.