Quick! Get Me My Ruby Slippers!

Yesterday, we woke up to pounding rain. Not unusual in London. In fact most days lately include some rain. We are learning not to go anywhere, even to the corner to buy a newspaper, without our umbrellas in hand. Even if you wake up to blue sky, it is wise to tuck a small one in your purse, backpack or pocket. Included in yesterday’s rain was a pretty powerful wind, which really renders umbrellas quite useless.

I have a new friend here in London and we have made it our goal in the first year to go to all the big shopping areas. We are methodically checking them off our list, one by one. So yesterday was Sloane Square. That is the neighborhood where Princess Diana lived before she was married and before she was a Princess. So while we were in the sports store buying Snake some swim goggles, it just started raining like crazy. A bit of hail came down and because of the wind, it just pelted the windows. It sounded like someone throwing dozens of pebbles at the windows continuously. The shop workers were freaked and urged us to stay in the store until the hail was over. We were glad to oblige. When we walked to the next store, it was only raining but we really couldn’t use our umbrellas. So we just stayed in the stores a bit longer than we usually would and amused ourselves. You can guess how.

When I get home, I hear that a tornado had touched down in London. Holy Wicked Witch of the West, Batman!! It happened right around the time of the hail. Not in the neighborhood we were in but very close to where we live. It damaged 100 homes, 24 are completely destroyed. Pretty amazing. I guess it is not that surprising so much damage was done given the density of housing in London. I would think it would be the same amount of damage if a tornado had touched down in San Francisco. The neighborhood this happened in is just 2 neighborhoods over, a 20-minute bus ride – which isn’t that far. Apparently the winds were clocked at 130 mph.

Now weird coincidence. Kiki is going to see the play Wicked tonight in London with some of her friends (her third time). For those of you just coming out of your 4 year old coma, Wicked is a play about the good witch and bad witch in the Wizard of Oz and how they met many years prior to Dorothy, Toto, The Scarecrow, et. al. I shudder to think what might have happened to London if she was going to see Dirty Dancing instead!