fire, fire

This morning I headed off to work, it was raining. By the time I got to work it was pouring. The lightning was so bright sometimes that it seemed fully daylight. I got to work, opened the truck door and popped open my umbrella. I headed towards the building. I had to hold tight to my umbrella because the wind was trying to blow it away. In a moment, it nearly did. My umbrella flipped inside and out. I am getting soaked and cussing all the way to the building. Flippin' great! I got upstairs to my desk, threw down my keys, I am upset because it took so much extra time to get there also. I worked for about 20 minutes and headed off to my class at Northlake and it was barely raining. Not long after my class fully started, my mother called. I sent her call to voicemail and sent her a text that I was in class. She texted back to call her cell when I got a chance. Her cell?...shouldn't she be at work by now? When my class took a break, I stepped into the hallway to call her. She started telling me about how lightning had hit her house and a caused a fire in the attic. They had damage to the living room also. I was at first speechless. I wanted to think she was joking with me, but she was so serious. I told her I would check back in later and went back to class since they had it all under control. I must have looked different when I came back to class because 5 people asked if I was okay. My class resumed and we took another break. I called my husband who said he, my sister & my brother were going to head down...but I wanted to go. I wanted to go see the damage and help get whatever needed to be done done. My supervisor in also in my class so I stepped back in and asked her to step out in the hall. When I told her what was going on, she was like go..go...why are you still here? I really wanted to stay for the last hour of class, but I really wanted to go. When we got back in, we were given our certificates and my supervisor said she was given me a pass to go ahead and leave. Everyone wished me well and I briefly thanked my instructor, he was awesome. I headed down to my mom's.

The damage wasn't as bad as I was expecting. It was still bad though. The fire started in the attic when lightning hit the house. The fire likely came down the chimney and found electrical wires and sparked the fire. Mom said that they lost some electric in the house and could smell smoke. They were trying to flip the switches out when David opened the attic door. In the attic they could see the flames. My grabbed the dogs, her purse and cell phone and headed out of the house calling 911. David went to wake my step-brother to find out that he wasn't home. The firemen showed up and filled the street with trucks. The fire and firemen had broken a gas line in the attic also. So there is no power or gas and these things can't be turned on until both are repaired. The adjuster comes out tomorrow. Today, we pulled up the carpet in the living room and hallways since they were soaked. Mom and David packed up a couple days worth of things and we headed towards my house. They will stay here for a few days until the insurance decides what will happen.

Overall, I am glad that everyone is safe. It is quite interesting that this happened today...a day when my brother woke up with a sinus headache and wasn't going in....a day when my sister decided to take a personal day off work...a day when my husband was at home....a day when I was easily able to get off work...a day when my step-brother didn't have to be at work. Oh, what a day it has been.

Here are some pictures from the day.

You can also see pictures already uploaded onto my brother's Flickr.