Back in California, we had summer thunderstorms.

But nothin’ like what happened on Tuesday.

If we lived somewhere flat, I’d have been huddling in the cellar. Because there is no that the sky can be these colors without mayhem following.

This was the beginning…

Sustained wind at 40 mph? Blowing all the newly mown field grass and dirt up the street?

Up to 100 lightning strikes per hour?

An inch of rain in an hour?

“Hasn’t been like this since I was a girl” said my neighbor who has lived here her entire life. “Did you bring it with you?”

The double rainbow came in the middle

And my husband, standing outside with the camera. No matter our cell phones were blaring warnings to stay inside, downstairs and away from windows.

The dogs were not impressed. Sugar retreated to my closet and stayed there til morning. Lizzie, who is too stubborn to follow Sugar’s example on principle, had to get the fur scared off her on the balcony by a huge boom of thunder.

It was a fine and awe-inspiring display of the majesty of the heavens. Take a look. These pictures are basically the same view over the course of an hour.