One good reason NOT to move to Texas...

Never saw a dust storm before in my life...

February 24, 2007 is a date that I probably won't forget for a while.

Here's the view from my front doorstep looking west, right into the dust storm that blew all the way across the state and dumped dust all over everything and even into everything.

These pictures have NOT been edited. That's not a sepia tone effect I've added; that is the real color of the sky at 2:30 in the afternoon on an otherwise clear day.

Lots of people, including our family have been having a lot of allergy problems in the days that followed this storm. I can still smell the dust in the air inside the house as we've been doing some spring cleaning, and I can even taste it sometimes. It's thick, nasty stuff and it's definitely one reason to NOT move to Texas.

Being from California, I'm used to skies that turn brownish, but not even the worst smog in the world compares to this stuff. One moment the sky was clear blue, a strong wind had cleaned out the thunderstorm of the night before, and then suddenly, here came a wall of brown. (I wish I'd had my camera with me where I could take a picture of the sky separated into brown and blue - another odd sight I've never experienced before)