Thunder and Lightning, Shaking Chacala

Chacala had lots of rain and thunder and lightning last night. It started about 4am and lasted two or three hours. Power was out from 4am to about 10am. It was wild. Lots of wind and rain.
Several times it felt like the lightning was hitting the house, but I don't think it was. The building shuddered though. I love watching the lightning from inside the house, but it's still kind of scary. Very very loud and right overhead. It's sounds like the sky is cracking open.

The ocean looked cool. My roof leaked for the first time. One leak was right on the middle of my forehead, and the other was was over my worktable. So I moved the bed and the tables in the dark. Since the electricity was off.

Gracie, my kitty (well, I am sharing her with Kevin and Kathy when they come back) didn't seem to mind the rain. She when out twice in the night. The second time she was soaking wet and she let me dry her off before she went back with the kittens. She's a good mom so far, but I think the childcare bit is starting to bore her. This is their five-day birthday, and they are active and loud. Meow, meow, meow. We were walking on the beach about 9pm last night, and you could hardly see any stars. Not a good sign. I think this was the strongest storm this summer, but not the strongest storm I have seen in Chacala.Pretty exciting. Hard to sleep.

There are still more summer gringo tourists than the past three summers. Way more. Mostly nice families and couples. There was a four-man group at Mars Tres last night that I would describe as skin-head surfers, maybe. I think the LA Times article last winter, by Chris Reynolds, may be what has caused the summer increase. That article about Chacala was published in newspapers all over the country. He didn't describe the summer climate here in the article, so some people are probably surprised at the heat, humidity, and rain. Today the weather is greater and the sun was out by 11am.There's lots of mud and water on the roads, but the worker trucks came driving him this morning. Later than usual, but coming to work. And the big trucks are back in force. Ugh.I am in Las Varas. I went to the tianguis with some visitors from Spokane, and then came over to the internet place. The market was pretty sparse. Maybe half the normal number of booths. I bought a red grapefruit, some grapes, and a melon.

And I had to cook my chicken breasts first thing this am because they were defrosted, so I am going home to a chicken sandwich and a little fruit salad. Perfect.