Gordon William Truman Pappas (and a tornado)

Last week I got to visit my Grandpa for his 90th birthday party.

Here's a recap in Instagram pictures.

The new BART line from SFO to the rest of the Bay Area is super convenient, albeit stinky.

My dad is very smart.

And it's very entertaining to watch him use my iPad.

We had a party for my grandpa and in true Pappas style, there was a program.

Apparently my mom and her brothers and sisters were in the Pappasito Brass in their youth.

(Never-mind that the Pappas ancestry is Greek)

Here they are "practicing."

 Two of my cousins came and played an original composition for my grandpa called "The Man, The Legend."

It was written for theremin and mandolin.

Don't know what a theremin is?

Check it out here.

Grandpa also inspected my iPad.

The sound was too tinny for his taste.

Which, with regards to musical matters, is impeccable.

I found this treasure on the shelf at grandpa's house.

A vintage Weight Watchers Official Scale.

There were so many wonderful moments while I visited, these pictures hardly do it justice.

It totally reaffirmed my love for my family.

And for the Bay Area.

Anyone know of an area we can live that has great schools and we don't have to make 6 figures?

Anyone?

I got home Friday night.

Which was perfect timing, because we had a tornado Saturday.

At 8, Aleks told me he was going downstairs to "watch the storm."

Around 9:30 or so the sirens went off.

We woke up the girls and took them down to the basement.

At one point the weather man said the tornado's trajectory would lead it to Central and 159th.

We live off of Central between 143rd and 159th.

About a month ago, Aleks bought a tornado kit online.

I made so much fun of him for it.

The storm got closer and hail started to come down so we moved from the center of the basement into the bathroom.

And about 5 minutes later we lost power.

Thankfully we had a tornado kit and there was a crank style flashlight/radio and glow sticks.

The girls were super excited.

15 minutes after the power went out, we heard the all clear come over the radio.

Aleks ventured up to find an untouched house.

In the morning, we saw this in our neighbor's backyard.

And throughout our neighborhood there were many trees that had fallen in the 70 mph wind.

Down the street a pole holding up a power line had cracked and was perilously leaning towards the road.

We were lucky.

Unscathed.

Just tired from our unplanned basement party.

I feel like I can now say I'm from Kansas.

Tornado

Yesterday my mom, Ruby, and I were upstairs unpacking boxes.

Aleks was in the basement setting up the cable.

Maia was napping.

All of a sudden I hear a siren. I look at my mom with big eyes.

"Do you think that's a tornado warning?"

We listen to the siren awhile longer.

It shows no signs of stopping.

Adrenaline starts pumping through my system, and I holler down to Aleks.

We open the backyard door and look at the sky.

There isn't a cloud to be seen, but I don't know how tornadoes work.

Are we in the eye of the storm?

As Aleks comes running up the stairs the sirens stop.

My mom and I look sheepishly at each other.

"It must have just been a fire truck."

..................

Later that night Aleks and I had dinner with some of his new colleagues. As I'm retelling this story and laughing at my naivety we are informed that every Monday at noon the tornado sirens are tested.

Sure enough, yesterday was Monday.

So I guess if I hear those sirens any other time than noon on Monday, we should head to the basement?

I'd better do some research on this whole tornado thing...