I was gone only an hour!

Last night I went to have another of my free birthday meals for dinner. While I was eating it began raining. No big deal.

I finished eating early enough to use the back entrance to my apartment complex. (It is closer to my parking space, but closes at 10pm.) As I made the turn my first thought was, "We don't have shrubs there." Then I realized that a large tree had fallen across the driveway. I was able to drive around one end.

As I continued to my apartment I realized that I had missed some serious storm activity. A stop sign had blown over, and the ground was littered with palm bark. Palm bark??? We don't have any palm trees!

I took my new camera to shoot some photos of the damage. I'm still getting used to the settings; I'm not happy with the results, but I was soaked to the skin and the camera was getting wet, so I quit.

I may try again in the daylight tomorrow.

By the way...as far as I can tell there was no damage to people, animals or property, other than the tree.

Update: I just saw a story on the news about the storms last night. There was record-breaking rainfall in some places. Tempe actually was at the bottom of the range; the city east of us received more than 3". A government office there is closed, after a retaining wall burst and flooded the building with mud. One man was trapped by a falling tree, but it landed on his prosthetic leg; he was fine once bystanders lifted the tree.