Tornado Update

I promise the pictures do exist. Mom says I should have them by tomorrow, so I'll be able to spend some time posting tomorrow evening.

Meanwhile, the newspaper had a pretty nice article in today's paper. You can find it here. There aren't any pictures with the article, but it does tell the story from Jeff's perspective. I learned a couple of things I'd not heard before, at any rate.

I talked to Lori yesterday and asked how the town meeting went Friday night. She said the mayor announced he already had his building permit and was planning begin reconstruction on his home soon. (Nice symbolism of leadership!) They were able to turn on the lights at the baseball diamond (I think that was the place she said) - so there's at least that much functioning electricity in town. Dillons, the supermarket, announced its intention to rebuild. She said she imagined that meant the Kwik Shop would also be back, because they are under the same ownership. The Kwik Shop is the convenience store. A girl after my own heart, Lori appreciates the need for fountain drinks. :) She also said the kids have been promised a bigger, better school than the one they had before.

In other "nice" news, she told me that the phone company has stopped billing the town effective the night of the tornado. They have also offered to forward original home phone numbers to new, temporary dwellings if people wish to have that done. She explained that typically, the surrounding towns are long distance from each other but have temporarily been switched to local calling to make it easier for family and friends to stay connected in this time. She was able to set up a post office box - free of charge for two months. A big thank you to the phone company and post office for making these services available!

No decisions have been made yet regarding their church. It is still too overwhelming for the congregation. They're focusing on trying to clean up their homes.

I realize that's not a ton of information, but it is what I have for now!