And, belatedly, Congrats, John!! Is the gender of said babe known or is it a surprise? What names await him/her? How excited ARE you? I assume, of course, that pictures of the wee one are already forthcoming. I remember when my husband's daughter gave birth for the first time 4 years ago, her first words to Grandpa were an awed and exhausted, "I made a person..." Julie Krueger On 6/6/08, Julie Krueger <juliereneb@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > It seems an entirely proper time to ask who, amongst us, has personally > witnessed volcanic lightening? > > > http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Carlos-Gutierrez/photo//080511/photos_ts/2008_05_11t154356_450x300_us_chile_volcano_environment/;_ylt=AktsnX3TnyuO3vZ21peBenADW7oF > > It hadn't crossed my mind as being a phenomena, much less did I know that > "Cases > of electrical storms breaking out directly above erupting volcanoes are well > documented, although scientists differ on what causes them. > I can only imagine that such a thing would be a supremely impressive > sight/sound/smell/feel. I would give a fair amount to be within palpable > distance. I can't really begin to imagine what humans, > pre-atmospheric-understanding, must have thought at these events. > > All we have here is a line of thunderstorms with damaging winds, baseball > size hail, flash floods, and tornado watches and warnings as the flickering > TV channel follows the tornado touch-downs from west to east, telling us > when it is too late to seek shelter, how many minutes we have left until > Certain Disaster. It's amazing the talent the weather folk have for > convincingly announcing Armageddon every 10 minutes. Of course the best > part (and probably the only real part, come morning) of this is that this > "significant squall line" causing a "serious situation" is not going to cool > our patch of earth or atmosphere more than 2 degrees below today's intensely > humid 90 degrees. > > On the bright side, It's summer, folks! There's a big shiny thing in the > sky! > > Julie Krueger > heartened and going out to witness powers >