Remember the Tornado Party when we had to take cover?

Saturday, September 17th was interesting to say the least. We were throwing a small get together at my house to watch the USC/NU game on ABC. The game was not what I liked to see. I was hoping that NU might build off some sort of offensive success early in the game and compete to win, but what we were treated with was run after run that only exposed how my Nebraska team still needs a lot of help on the offensive line and a lot of help in the defensive secondary, but that's not what this story is about.

One of the guests mentioned to me that the thunderheads developing outside to the east were really tall, so tall that they no longer were in our atmosphere, but in the stratosphere...

I kind of know what she meant, but not really. But hey, the clouds did indeed look extremely tall, so I went with it and even started telling people at the party, "You should see the thunderhead clouds forming outside. They're so tall that they're no longer in our atmosphere..."

A little after halftime, the weather started to get a little scary. Thunder started booming and some rain started. On the TV, the weather guy broke in with a split screen to mention that some possible tornado clouds had been spotted in our area... and were headed right towards us. At this point, it was decided that we should probably move downstairs to some more safety.

One of my wife's co-worker's joked, "Oh this is great! If only I had stayed at home, I'd be well clear of this storm. Out west, we're in the middle of it."

Another one quipped, "Yeah, for years, we'll be going 'Hey, remember when we went to Laura's tornado party and had to take cover in the basement?'"

Our neighbor was next door looking after her baby while her kids were downstairs with the rest of us. Laura suggested that we should go next door and go get her, so she could be in the basement with us since our neighbor's basement was unfinished and she was upstairs with the baby, not exactly the safest place. Laura called her up and headed over to her house to help her come over. A few minutes later, I get a call that I think is from Laura.

I hear nothing but wind and then I hear, "Hello?..."

I ask, "I'm here... "

"HellO?"

"Yes!"

"Bob?"

"Yes! Talk to me!"

"Oh sorry, this is Jessica (my neighbor down the street). I was just letting you guys know that you should get everyone in the basement."

"They are," I replied.

"Good. Because there is a funnel cloud that is hanging over my house. It keeps going up and down, but it hasn't touched ground yet."

I panic and sprint upstairs and throw open the door. I step outside and there in what seems to be the middle of the road right at about rooftop height, is a fairly large, white funnel cloud. It wasn't exactly the text book one that you would expect from a spinning cloud, but it was close enough for me! I look over to my left and see my neighbor and her baby. I usher them inside the house. I look the funnel cloud again and over to my left again and see Laura fiddling with the neighbor's door. She's carrying a dog carrier that must have their dog, Snoopy, in it. I yell, "Hurry up!"

She's moving slow.

I yell louder, "HURRY UP!"

She looks at me a little confused. I point behind her. Laura turns around, glances at the funnel cloud and starts hightailing at a much faster pace towards our house. I guess it's nothing like a storm right in front of you to get people moving...

We run inside. I close the door and (for some odd reason) lock the deadbolt (as if that would stop the storm). We run downstairs. I take a quick inventory of the people down there. Everyone seems accounted for. I decide to get the cats rounded up.

The storeroom has a hole in the wall for the cats to jump through to get to the food and their litter. I quickly block the hole with a large box and throw other heavy items behind it. I walk out of the storeroom and grab the two cats that were down there, Moe and Susie. I think Murphy (our other cat) is still upstairs.

I yell to Laura, "I'm going to get Murphy! The tornado's outside! (for some reason I yell this as it wasn't a tornado yet).

I start upstairs and Julia asks, "Tornado? Where?" She starts mounting the stairs to follow me! "I want to see!" she exclaims excitedly. One of Laura's co-workers quickly grabs Julia and takes her back downstairs telling her "we're going to have some fun!"

I rush upstairs and head towards the bedroom. I look in the bedroom and don’t find her. I run out back into the living room and look behind the couch. There she is. I pull the couch out and grab her. Murphy protests with some “rororr” sounds. She starts to thrash a little bit and giving her tendency to scratch me with her hind legs, I hold her back feet with my free hand while running down the stairs. Her heart is racing as we pass by the people downstairs. She protests again and I feel something warm on my chest.

I drop her in the storeroom and close the door behind me. I examine my shirt. It’s wet in a spot. So are my shorts. Murphy has peed on me!

This happened one other time when we were just getting ready to show our house to some people who were going to buy our house. They had brought their parents to show them the house. It was my duty to round up the cats and shove them in a large pet carrier so the buyers could tour the house without a cat attack. I get Moe in first, but Murphy protests and proceeds to pee a large amount of urine all over me. I am completely soaked on one side of my body. I had to rush upstairs, change out of my clothes and change fast before the buyers walked in. Thankfully, Murphy didn’t blow that sale.

With my clothes soaked in pee and a potential tornado outside, I did what most guys would do in that situation, I went back upstairs to change.

I ran into my bedroom again, grabbed a shirt and a pair of shorts and went downstairs into the storeroom with the cats to change.

When all was said and done, I joined our guests downstairs as we waited for the storm to subside. The funnel cloud didn’t drop, so we were spared damage.

The next day, I told my brother, Bill, about the experience.

His first question was: “Did you get video?”

Yeah… Because that was my first instinct! Screw getting my family safe and the animals safe. I needed to make sure that I got some sweet video of a possible tornado. Granted, that would have been cool, but my mind was elsewhere…