After Isaac

Isaac has finally left our area (it is now bedeviling the poor residents of Arkansas), but it made quite an impact on "the landmass" before it left.

Yes, this is the ACTUAL tornado watch box that was in effect all day yesterday, stretching hundreds of miles inland from LA to FL.

Some residents in our area are likely to be without power for several days, and flooding is still a concern throughout the state.  There is no telling right know how bad the damage was right down on the coast, but it looks pretty awful.  Miraculously, my own home never lost power, and even though my workplace seems to have had a few short outages overnight the other night, we had full power for the workday, so we more or less carried on as normal.  My little redbuds look a bit raggedy, but made it through, as did the figlet (hooray!) and my other plants.

The most shocking survival is the fact that the magnolia tree just next door made it through the storm.  To understand why this is such a shock, you should first have a look at a healthy magnolia tree:

Notice the luxurious, thick growth of healthy, dark-green leaves.  Magnolias are much-loved, of course, because they produce beautiful, creamy flowers all over, just about the whole warm season:

Now take a look at the tree next door. It looks slightly different than that first image.....

I have no earthly idea what ails that poor tree, but so far nothing has been able to finish the poor thing off and put it out of its misery.  My one colleague (readers may remember him as Super Sociable Guy) dubbed this tree "the Charlie Brown magnolia" for its resemblance to, well, this:

I think the analogy is fitting, don't you?

Note for those who don't get the "landmass" reference:  When the path of Isaac had yet to be determined, there was evidently a commentator on The Weather Channel who discussed a possible hit on Mobile, and a possible hit on New Orleans, and in the process dismissively referred to the territory in between (also known as Mississippi) as "the landmass in the middle".  This on the near-anniversary of Katrina, no less, which was devastating to the MS Gulf Coast.  The indignation on Facebook was epic.