It is vaguely disorienting to walk out your back door and find a piece of someone's chimney by your back steps. This sensation is not helped by looking up and realizing that the piece of chimney
actually belongs to you. OK, so it was just the chimney cap, so no big deal, but still, I prefer the pieces of my house to stay attached where they belong and not take up residence in the back lot.

Still and all, given some of the pictures we're seeing from elsewhere in Illinois, including in Champaign, we didn't fare too badly.

OK, I am officially revising my opinion of what passed through our neighborhood last night from straight-line winds to small tornado. There was a line of damage in our neighborhood running from the house of my Dean and one of my colleagues on faculty (all of their families are OK, but my Dean had a tree fall on his house -- minor damage) going generally northeast towards and through Carle Park. My Dean also pointed out that the trees that fell over in his yard and the one that fell over in our colleague's next door to him fell in different directions, which you wouldn't expect from straight-line winds. Further documentary evidence behind the cut.

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