icia 4.13.06.

thursday night brought five tornadoes to iowa city. our east-side neighborhood dealt with heavy rains, hail and wind, but the twisters didn't reach over here. on friday morning, rob and the rest of the city inspectors set out with their cameras to document the damage and map out the course the biggest (category F2, 150 mph winds) tornado took through town from walmart and menard's on highway 1 all the way to hickory hill park. here are some of the images rob captured...

rob specifically wanted to get a photo of the wrecked dairy queen on riverside drive and the old neon sign out front that's still defiantly standing. there were clean-up volunteers on the scene picking up the myriad red plastic DQ spoons that littered the parking lot and river bank. i love the photo the press citizen got of a kid handing out dilly bars on thursday night before they melted.
this is a shot of ralston creek taken from evans street. there was a creek clean-up scheduled for this weekend. i can't decide if that timing is totally awful or completely perfect.
in her college days, my mom was an alpha chi omega sorority sister. she suggested with a smirk that we offer up some of our basement space to a few of the displaced UI alpha chis--their house got a pretty bad beating, as you can see. it's a good thing the university has set up alternate housing for students whose housing was destroyed--i'm not sure i could handle such a rapid influx of gauchos, uggs and big sunglasses into my living space. not-so-happy joe's. the former pizza joint's roof is totally peeled back, and that apartment building in the rear, which also housed tony's grill (a popular breakfast place), has been condemned and is destined for a tear-down.
this is st. patrick's catholic church. i'm totally dumbfounded by that gaping space where all the bricks were blown away and the bare bones of the roof are exposed. looking past that initial visual shock, click on the photo and check out the wooden beams that have inserted themselves into the adjacent building and the chunks taken out of those walls by flying debris from the church. i lived on this block of hudson street before in moved in with rob. despite all the damage to property caused by the storms, there was only one reported fatality and relatively few injuries. still, iowa city's tree population took a huge hit. the stately oaks of college green park are mostly gone, as are many of the trees on iowa ave., college st. and around the johnson county courthouse.

you can see more photos of damage and recovery at the daily iowan online and at the press citizen link above. we'll keep you updated as clean-up continues and rejuvenation begins...

oscar & gunner

this afternoon, oscar got to play with gunner, our neighbors kelli and david's great dane. you can tell best from the middle photo (they're sniffing the snarly pit bulls that live on the other side of that fence) just how much bigger gunner is than oscar. he's still growing 5lbs. every week. i think our dear little westie is a bit intimidated by his towering stature and enormous paws. apparently, one of gunner's favorite passtimes is gnawing on big sticks. he's a hoot.
spring temperatures made for a puttering around the house kind of weekend. leaf blowing, gutter clearing, storm-window removing, summer bulb and birdseed buying, etc. now that we're having days in the 60s, i'm getting greedy and already thinking about t-shirt and sandal weather and saturday-morning trips to the farmers' market (sigh).

growing

springtime is slowly but surely making it into our backyard. i decided to rake around our little garden plot and get it cleaned up so the daffodil and tulip bulbs i planted in the fall could really soak up some sunshine. in the meantime, i discovered this lovely little hyacinth by the back fence that i don't remember being around last year. it's flower magic! we had a good deal of rain yesterday and everything seems to have grown at least an inch overnight. last year's attempt to grow some vegetables in the very same plot was, i hate to admit it, a big, fat failure. it was mostly neglect on my part (is it super lame to blame it on wedding planning?), but our shady trees also bear some responsibility. now that we just spent a lot of money getting those trees trimmed (if this whole public health/anthropology thing doesn't work out, i'm buying some professional-grade loppers and a cherry picker and going into business) i might give it another shot and promise to be a more diligent weeder.


my scarf is also growing! it's really a prettier, more vibrant shade of green than this photo would have you believe. i fear that i will never read another novel because knitting will completely and utterly take over my leisure time. fortunately, knitting hasn't even put a dent in my reality TV habit.
har de har.

betsy, pete & henry's big move

this weekend we ventured to the chicago suburbs to help betsy, pete and henry move from their condo into their adorable new house. i hope i'm not breaching blogging etiquette by writing about this before betsy does, but i'm sure she'll be spending at least the next few days or so unpacking boxes and feathering the nest with nary a moment to spare on blogger's slow photo uploading speeds. keep an eye on her blog for more moving news--for now, here's a taste of saturday's excitement...
when we planned the trip, we anticipated lots of lugging and heavy lifting, but since they hired a hilarious band of professional movers, we mostly just hung out with henry (see photo of rob, henry and rob's toasted coconut donut--the breakfast of champions), spent the afternoon being fed sloppy joes and chocolate cake by pete's mom and chilling out in the new digs.
the pros were well under way with the hoisting and hauling by the time we arrived and soon, rob and i were saying our last goodbyes to the orange living room and the rest of the condo (they don't close till the end of the month, so they'll continue to empy the cupboards and make way for the new owners) and making our way to the new neighborhood. the house is within walking distance of a big park, waterslides and a velodrome (aka bike racing track)--how many homeowners can say that? we love the floor plan, big windows, screen porch, and backyard. there are beautiful hyacinths blooming outside the kitchen windows right now--a nice spring touch.
betsy and pete are already choosing paint colors and deciding how to make the space their own. like any decades-old home, this one has plenty of quirky features that inspired a good deal of laughter on saturday--the unique wicker fixtures in the bathroom, the beeping ceiling fan that mysteriously builds speed seemingly of its own will, and the medieval-inspired murals in the third bedroom which we will refer to as "prince kyle's room" long after it's painted.
it was really fun to see pete and betsy's dream of a more spacious, family-friendly place of their own come to fruition and to be a part of the big day!