Yes, I know that Wednesday is not the day that immediately follows the weekend, but its the first time I've been at work since Sunday. I wanted to blog about the tornadoes that devastated the south. We covered the out break through out the weekend. I watched the storms not only on radar, but through the national weather service and their issuance of watches and warnings. I also followed along with the damage, injury and death reports and they flew in. Unfortunately the latter of those was too high. Anything higher than zero is too high in my book.

When I looked at information on Friday afternoon (nearly 24 hours before the first watch came out) I could tell it had the potential to be a big day for severe weather. The storm prediction center agreed as they already had a moderate risk outlined in the area that was eventually hit. That's nearly 24 hours of warning for people that there was a chance of significant severe weather. I'm sure that the media was mentioning the threat during the evening and late news.

As I watched the reports come in it started with a watch, then warning after warning ran across the screen. It was obvious that what was predicted was coming true. I hoped that cites would avoid the brunt of the storm, but that didn't end up being the case. From what I heard the town of Picher, OK was destroyed and probably won't exist ever again (mostly because of the mine nearby, but the tornado did do some major damage). It was an EF-4 tornado, which puts winds over 166 mph. With that kind of wind, houses will be destroyed and chances are there will be injuries and possibly deaths.

From the reports the hardest hit areas were in northeastern Oklahoma and southwestern Missouri. I've also heard lots of stories of people trying to run from the tornado in cars and evacuating their mobile homes at the last minute. This saddens me in a way because they had 24 hours or so to prepare. The tornado watch was issued a few hours before the tornado hit so they could have that time to get ready for a tornado too. Also, it appears the tornado warning was issued around 15 minutes before the tornado struck.

I guess I don't understand why people wait until the event is happening to them to take action. It only takes a few minutes to think about what you would do during a tornado and then discuss it with your family. I really hope we don't have an event here like this past weekend in the south. If we do, I would hope that the death toll was much closer to zero.

I guess I should start this story out by saying that if you've got a bit of a soft stomach, then you might not want to read this. I'm not planning on going into gory detail, but as I found out today, some people have a soft stomach for some things.

Yesterday, I went to the gym to play basketball as I do every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I decided not to lift weights this week because I've been having some lower back issues that would most likely go away with some rest. So I began playing and everything was going well. However, that changed with one loose ball. I was in place to scoop up the ball and began charging down the court on a one-on-one fast break situation. That was my first mistake. A man who is 6' 5" and uncoordinated shouldn't be running down the court by himself trying to dribble the ball and score.

The story gets really interesting when I tried to lay the ball up. There was some contact, but most likely not even enough to call a foul. It did knock me off balance slightly. As I was coming down I attempted to avoid the base of the goal. In doing so my balance was lost even more. After the 2 or 3 inch drop from the court to the concrete base, my balance was completely lost and I was still moving at full speed. This is when I went head first into a wall. Ouch!

I consider myself pretty lucky because the cut I suffered is in the back of my head. It took 5 small staples to repair the gash. That sounds impressive, but I learned that staples are almost always used on head cuts rather than stitches. Other part of my body are beat up pretty bad too. I've got a big bruise on my shoulder and one on my elbow too. My neck has whiplash on top of all that. My neck actually seems to be tightening up throughout the day.

Looking back on it I had no business trying to score in that situation. I should have just pulled up and let the play work itself out rather than force the issue. It wasn't anyone in particular fault and it really wasn't the fault of the guy who was guarding me. Like I said before, it may have not even been a foul. I owe a big thanks to Patrick Griesgraber for giving me a ride since I couldn't drive and another to Kent Erdahl for helping me out too! Also, for a reenactment of the event, just refer to Tim Peters. He was there and made sure I was ok, which I was thankful for.

I was enjoying my time not lifting weights for the week. But it looks like that break just got extended by a two more weeks.

I know May started on Thursday, but so did severe weather season so a lot of my focus that day was on the severe weather. So although its a few days late, I've got to talk about why I like, no love, the month of May so much.

I was thinking about it the other day. Every month has something that I like. I can even list them. January has Bowl season, February has the Superbowl, and March has March Madness. April took me a while, but it does have the Masters and June has the U.S. Open. July is without a doubt the best month to be outside and on a lake, two of my favorite things to do. August is my birthday month and football starts. Football continues through December and I have many family birthdays and holidays to celebrate during the last five months of the year.

As you can see, I'm always looking forward to something, but I did leave May out. That's because I can't fit all of what I like about May in one sentence. First off, its the unofficial start of summer. It's when I start to spend more time at the lake and around the campfire. That's a big one for me since I enjoy the nice weather a lot. I also enjoy the active weather that comes along with May, but not too much (see my previous blog). Up until this year it was also the month in which school let out for the summer and I got to get into working 40 hours a week and actually having an income. However, since I graduated last year, I don't think I can mark that down as a reason anymore.

The biggest reason I love this month so much is because of something I try not to talk about on my blog too much. However, I can't help myself this time. The whole month is filled with practice, qualifying and building anticipation all for the Indy 500. Today was the start of practice for the race which isn't even until Memorial Day weekend! Next weekend is the first weekend of qualifying and the next weekend is the third day of qualifying and then Bump Day. If you've ever watched bump day back in the late 90s, then you know that it can be one of the most exciting days in sports.

Of course after all the weeks of practice and qualifying there's the week of the race which is filled with build up. Raceday is the greatest day for me in sports all year. This year I hope a lot of KSFY viewers also watch the race since it is on ABC. I think people, especially those who already like racing, will like the 500 more than they expect to.

I know I try not to talk about racing too much in my blog, but this month might be an exception to that rule. Especially on the weekends when all the qualifying is taking place.

Covering severe weather is quite the double edged sword. It is a chance for us to perform and we appreciate those of you who stuck with us for the information. The forecasting for severe weather is typically enjoyable and I also enjoy the fast paced nature during the actual event. There's also the other side though. I don't want any property damage and I really don't want to see anyone get killed or even hurt during the storms.

Thursday was my first big dose of severe weather coverage. It is a process that definitely takes it out of you. All the incoming information can come at you fast and furious. I want to get the information out as quickly as possible so that you can take cover. On Friday morning when I woke up I was more than happy to find out there were no significant injuries reported from the Tornado and more importantly, no deaths. It made me feel like Phil, Patrick and Myself had done our jobs. Especially considering the size and magnitude of the tornado.

When I look at a calendar I often find myself thinking "what was I doing one year ago today?" Well I did that this morning and I realized, I was taking my last round of finals for College. So this week one year ago was not a fun one. Then I got to thinking about the end of my college career and what It meant to me. That's when I suddenly started missing a lot of things.

At Purdue, they wait a week between finals and graduation. Its a week called "senior week" when there's not a whole lot to do other than pack your belongings and say goodbye to friends. I had a lot of good friends in college. My roommates were great and I had a lot of good times with them. I also was in a very small class of 12 people. We were more than close. We were like a large family.

During my senior week I spent a lot of time with these people. We had something to do everyday. We played softball, ate lunch at our favorite establishments, and even made it down to Indianapolis for a Indy Racing Practice. Going down to Indianapolis was the most fun because there was a rain delay and we had to take shelter at my place where we played pool and ate pizza for hours.

The week was a blast and it was capped off on graduation day which was that Saturday. From the moment I walked onto the campus that day with my family I had tears in my eyes. It hit me out of no where what I was leaving behind. My roommates and I were all really close, my class was moving all across the country, and I was going home where I didn't have a ton of friends. I was lucky in the fact that my two best friends from Meteorology, Becky and Jen, were not moving far away, but I wasn't going to be able to do the random college things that always seemed to happen!

I miss being in college at times. There's a lot that happened during the four years in West Lafayette, both good and bad. It was mostly good and I miss the learning too. However, every time I talk to someone who is still in college, I'm glad I'm done!

Well we all know that the snowstorm on Friday was significant. We saw near-blizzard like conditions in Watertown throughout the day. I-29 was shut down for about 18 hours or so. Mitchell saw another dose of heavy snow. Siioux Falls didn't see too much snow, as it dodged another bullet, something the city has done all year it seems. This wasn't just a storm that will be a story to tell, but one for the record books. As late as this morning I got another notification from the National Weather Service about a record being broke. I'm going to try to sum these records up for you, so here goes...

Let's start with the records from the Sioux Falls NWS office. Sioux Falls ended up with 3.5 inches of snow. This breaks the daily record of 0.2 inches that was set in 1953. Huron set a new daily record at 9 inches! That shattered the old record of 1 inch in 1937. As I already mentioned, Mitchell got a big dose of snow. 11.2 inches to be exact. The daily record before this was 1937 with 0.5 inches.

Alright, now on to the records in the North which are counties in the NWS Aberdeen branch's area. Let's start with the record daily snowfalls. Aberdeen saw 1.4 inches of snow, which actually was a record. The old record was 0.7 inches in 1950. More impressive was the snowfall in Sisseton. They totaled 6.9 inches which broke the old record of 2.0 inches in 1937. Sisseton also saw 1.9 inches of snow on Saturday Morning, beating the old record for that day which was 1.1 inches in 1932. Watertown was without a doubt the hardest hit. 1937 did have the record at 8 inches. They beat that with a total of 19 inches. That also translated to a few other records. They had 1.12 inches of liquid precipitation (measured after the snow was melted). That broke the old liquid precipitation record of 0.94 in 1929.

To me the next two stats are the most impressive. During the 24 hour period in which the snow fell Watertown saw 19 inches of snow. That broke an all time record of 16 inches that was set on March 24, 1937. That's right, an all time record!!! Let's also consider the last 30 days in Watertown, in which they've had 32.5 inches. In a normal season (appoximatly 3 months) they see 31.3 inches. So in the last 30 days they've gotten more snow than they normally do in an entire winter. WOW.

In one of the reports an interesting stat came across. Late season snows like this arn't that uncommon. 1994 there was a late snow that dropped 10.5 inches on April 28th. Also, the latest measurable snow for a season was recorded on May 18th, 1968.

I need to thank the National Weather Service for passing all these stats along. Its simply amazing looking back on it. I was one of those systems that caught many by surprise, including me. I hope that this was the last for this year. However looking at models for the end of this week, we may night be out of the woods just yet.

I've mentioned before that the craziness and unpredictability of this job is one of the things I like. I don't mind if my schedule gets changed at moment's notice. I like doing coverage of severe weather although I don't like that it can be damaging to our viewers' property or dangerous for that matter. It's a bit of a double edge sword because the reason I'm doing what I like is because it could be dangerous to you.

I got to cover quite a bit of hazardous weather in the past week. Actually, I think I covered everything but a Tornado (which is ok with me). When I left the station on Sunday the big concern was fire danger. It was dry and windy, a more summer like setup with temperatures in the 70s. I was able to enjoy a few nice days off on Monday and Tuesday as the weather was very nice.

Wednesday was another nice day, but the changes were on the way. I had to work a different shift because we wanted to cover severe weather awareness day in South Dakota. Of course, right on cue that night we saw our first severe thunderstorm warning of the year for Tripp County. Quite a hail producer was moving through that county.

Thursday we had some thunderstorms that were on the fringe of being severe. There was a true threat of seeing something severe, but the right elements didn't quite come together. However, I still had to alter my schedule at the last moment to be prepared just in case. I thought that was an interesting day. I had no idea.

Friday my phone rang just before noon asking me to get to work ASAP because of the snow. I did and was amazed at what happened. 15+ inches of snow in some areas less than one week after having grass fires. During the day yesterday I didn't think about the big change, I was just concerned with the issue at hand.

This morning when I was eating my breakfast I got to thinking about the week. What a change. I went from talking about spring like conditions with Kent on the Desk to doing cut-ins for possibly the strongest winter storm of the year. Simply amazing. What's also amazing is that less than a month ago Pierre hit 90.

When I was in Indiana they always had that little saying about if you don't like the weather wait 5 minutes. Well they don't have anything on us. There were a lot of days in Indiana when I had to have my defrost on in the morning and my air conditioner on when I go home in the afternoon. I'm sure days like that aren't far off here!

I really don't like to brag. It makes me feel arrogant and that's not a way I want to be. But this is an exception to that. I also try to not blog about open wheel racing as much as possible because I don't think most of the readers of this don't care (although expect a lot during the month of May). Well this is an exception to that as well. So here goes.

I told you Danica Patrick would win an Indy Car race! I've had so many friends tell me she's not talented, she's just a major marketing ploy, she's the Anna Kournikova of open wheel racing. Wrong, wrong, and wrong! In case you don't know she won the Firestone Indy Car 300 last night. She's the first woman to win a race in one of the three major racing circuits (NASCAR Sprint Cup, Indy Racing League, and Formula One).

I first saw Danica race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 2005 when she qualified for the Indianapolis 500. For the Indy 500 qualification requires four laps and the total time from those laps is your qualification time. One the first lap she slid all over the place in turn 1, where I was sitting. This meant two things to me: Her lap was going to slower than it should have been and she was being as aggressive as possible and running for the poll. The fact she even saved the car was amazing as we had see other drivers earlier in the day do the same thing and meet the concrete.

I know that alot of people that are race fans will claim she won the race on fuel millage. Well that argument is severely flawed. First of all she still had to run a race and stay in the top few spots throughout the race so that when other cars needed to pit she could take advantage. She also used the proper strategy to get her tank topped off and then conserve fuel until the end. If you want to use the fuel millage argument then here's the biggest flaw. In the 2005 Indy 500 she was leading with less than ten to go and had to back off because she may have ran out of gas. Therefore Dan Wheldon won after passing her towards the end. By the way, the pass was after Danica had beaten Wheldon (one of the biggest talents in the sport) on two restarts in a row.

I'm very happy she won so that people can get off her back and she can race without pressure. I think this will actually lead to more wins in the future. Regardless of your opinion on Danica's talent you have to agree that this win and being competitive in every race will only help the sport. Which is exactly what this newly unified sport need.

I have to say that basketball is one of my favorite sports, but I don't particulartly like the NBA. I am from Indiana so I have to have some basketball in my blood, but I typically stick to High School and College. I absolutly love March for basketball, but the same feeling doesn't happen when the NBA playoff roll around. Well this year is a little bit different.

Here's why I don't like the NBA more than I do: The players are always in trouble, they don't play team basketball for the most part, and and my team (the Indiana Pacers) havn't had much to cheer about since Reggie Miller retired. The games are typically predictable and not very exciting. At the begininng of the year you can usually pick three or four teams that will win the chamipionship that year and normally be correct. Plus the playoffs are so long with four seven game series.

Well I'm actually into it this year. Maybe I'm just bored, or maybe the race has tightened up and many teams can win the championship. Teams are playing more like teams this year. There's alot to get exctied about in each conference too. Who's gonna win either conference is up in the air. I've watch two games so far and they've both been great. It seems that each series has a big story behind it that will keep me watching.

Personally I want San Antonio to win. They seem like a bunch of good guys who play the game the right way. Tim Duncan is a great player who does it right too. I laugh everytime he banks in a shot because it looks so boring, but is very effective.

I'm sure I'll have more posts about the different series over the next few weeks. I'm actually excited about it. We'll see if it lasts.

Did you even know that Steve McNair retired yesterday? It definitely didn't have the flair that Brett Farve had. I didn't know it until I got yesterday afternoon and I saw it on ESPN. I wasn't shocked by the news, but there was no hype before it like there is with many Quarterbacks.

As a Colts fan, I am supposed to say I hate Steve McNair. He was the Tom Brady for us in the late 90s and early 00s. We couldn't beat the titans for many years when he played there. One of the biggest reasons we had so much trouble is that we couldn't seem to tackle the man. He always got away from our rush somehow. It would amaze me that he could stand up to the huge linemen that would give him a beating.

When I think of Steve McNair I think of a person who loved to play the game. He was a player that could will his team to a victory. He nearly won a Super Bowl on an amazing last second drive that came one yard short. By the way, he wasn't supposed to be that good of a quarterback. However, it seems that he found a way to put himself in a place where he would have a moment in which he could pull it out for his team. More times than not he succeeded too.

I'm sure part of the reason he's retiring is because his body is banged up from many tough games. He wasn't a pocket quarterback that never got hit. It actually seemed that he like the crushing nature of scrambling. I hope he has a good retirement and that his body doesn't turn on him.