A Twister, a Twister!

Never in my life did I think I'd see the day when Diesel could sit comfortably next to another dog.

Well, ok, so when we first picked her up when she was only 3 months old, she was sitting with other dogs. And I wouldn't exactly say she was sitting comfortably.

But still, she and Rain sat within 2 feet of each other.

The Guy called me around 4 PM.

"Hey, I just wanted you to know there's a tornado warning in the area."

"What?"

"Yeah, I figured you weren't really sitting in front of the TV, so I should call you."

I turned off the portable DVD player that I was watching, snuggled Lulu extra tightly to me, and called Rain to stand by my side. I knew the best bet was to go downstairs, but as we all know, we have the "Downstairs Dog" living there.

I had a couple choices. One, I could hope a tornado wouldn't come and take Rain away. Or, two, I could bite the bullet, open the basement door, and let Rain and Diesel meet face-to-face, and hope that I wasn't going to end up prying two dogs off of one another while clutching a baby and hoping to God I don't fly away.

I was going to go with option 1, keeping Rain locked in my basement bathroom.

And when I realized she wasn't going to comply with that, I had to go with option 2.

It scared the crap out of me to open that door.

What happened next shocked the hell out of me. Diesel barely flinched at Rain. No hair standing on end, no horrible growling that sounds like she'd tear Rain to bits.

Of course, in retrospect, I realized that this was because Diesel is petrified of any sort of thunderstorm, and the loud horrible noise and the bright close lightning scared the crap out of her to the point where she could barely acknowledge Rain's presence.

So there I sat on the futon, Diesel on my left, Rain on my right, and Lulu sleeping soundly in her pack & play (which I put her in, in case I had to pry Diesel's jaws off of Rain's neck). I turned the TV on (as long as we still had power) so that I could keep track of just how much danger my family was in.

And even though the newscasters confirmed that the tornado warning was lifted just before 4:30, I knew the storm was weakening at the precise moment that Diesel finally glanced to my right side, saw Rain, and she started to lunge for her.

For the record, a tornado did end up touching down in our state, but it was about 35 miles away, closer to my brother E's home than my own (and still a good 5 miles from him too). And it's a good thing, too, cause in retrospect, the room I was sitting in was not a good place to be in a tornado (too many windows, and a sliding glass door, despite being partially underground). In fact, the only good "room" in my house is the crawl space under my staircase that is used as a pantry for all our non-perishable food items.

And frankly, I don't think me, a baby, an English Setter, and a Pitbull would fit there, so it's a good thing God was looking out for us!