The weather has been mild this holiday week. In the 60's, as a matter of fact, and aside from a little rain, pretty pleasant. The weather man has been talking for a week about storms north of us but wasn't indicating that we, this far south, would see any issues aside from the temperature dropping into the 20's and teens, overnight. 

Then late last night the warnings started; possible tornadoes, temperature drops, and whoa, 40 mph winds. The weather channel puts this out: Millions Under Alerts Winter Storm Ezra will pound the Upper Midwest before moving into the Northeast.

I took that as a sign to tie everything down. Temps in the 20's is normal this time of year, more normal than 60, but the 40 mph winds caught my attention. I've got a dead tree hanging over the fence I am rooting for but that kind of wind might be a problem. I'm relieved though, that I got the girls moved. Rolled some big planters onto the edge of my outdoor rug, secured the tarp over the bird run, made sure nothing was out. Done. Nothing left to do but worry. 

The tornado warnings came mid afternoon stating they would be effective until 8 p.m.. So when the clouds started rolling in I left for a drive. 

Things looked a bit tricky over Sue's place. 

The sky kept changing colors on me depending on the cloud cover and the lightening and made things a little creepy. The air was charged. 

I managed to catch just one of the lightning bolts. There were many, scattered, and today, too fast for me. I never did see any clouds that looked like it might start spinning and for that I am thankful. 

I had to chase this one, panning left from the last shot. 

And then in another spot, father to my left, the bolts stayed in the clouds. 

I traveled northeast of town to see what I could catch across the open fields. It looked like Pinckneyville was about to get hammered. I didn't catch any lightning out there, but I was able to see miles of these crazy clouds all lined out nice and neat. 
Weird. 

By 6 p.m. the winds were 31 mpg with gusts up to 40 mph. At 7:45 p.m. the tornado warning was cancelled. I check the wind speed again at 8:20 p.m. and it was still at 31 mph but the gusts are up to 51 mph. 

If you like to track weather conditions I enjoy using Ventusky at https://www.ventusky.com/

It shows you all kinds of weather measurements; it's my go-to during storm season. 

There's also Lightning Maps at https://www.lightningmaps.org/ This is the ap I follow to track lighting clusters in my area. It gets me to the right place at just the right time. 

I have no affiliations with either website. I just find them useful tools and wanted to share.