Rare, Red Sprite Bursts Near Amarillo

Per Digg  – Sprites are large, flickering discharges triggered by the discharges of positive lightening between an underlying thundercloud and the ground. They are also very cool looking.

Scott McPartland – Extreme Weather Photography (YouTube) – I managed to capture on video several vivid “Red Sprite” bursts, from a cluster of supercell thunderstorms putting out near constant lightning near Amarillo, TX. I was positioned about 20 miles to the south of the storms, near the town of Tulia, TX, looking off to the northeast. This definitely ranks up there with one of the best lightning storms I have ever seen. A more extended video can be viewed via the annotation link at the end of this video.

This video has been reviewed by several meteorologists at various NWS offices, as well as the Storm Prediction Center, and deemed to be 100% legitimate Red Sprites.

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Bag of Randomness for Friday, June 3, 2016

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  • I’ve never watched a Steph Curry game so I thought I’d turn on the NBA Finals last night. Of all things that left an impression, it was coach Steve Kerr breaking his clipboard by stabbing it with a marker. Well, maybe it was just his fist.
  • We had GeedingManor appraised yesterday. When the appraiser didn’t arrive 40-minutes past his scheduled time, I called him. He apologized and stated he double-booked the appointment and went to the other house first and would be over in half an hour, but arrived an hour later. I understand mistakes happen, but I was bothered that he couldn’t at least call and state he would be late, either time. He also stated he did an appraisal for another house in the neighborhood with the same floorplan so he wasn’t going to do any measurements upstairs. I’m not sure how I feel about that. I’ve been to other houses in the neighborhood with the same floorplan, but they aren’t exactly the same, they actually do differ.
  • LBJ, after the presidency, with what I would consider a mullet.
  • Imgur – I love how a large number of these students, and some teachers, wore the same shirt for their yearbook photos.
  • The leaders of the Big XII sure were acting quirky the last couple of days, but as I’ve said, there are few things more corrupt than college sports and the NCAA. Add to that, Baylor won’t release freshmen players out of their national letters of intent, which would be the right thing to do. Things aren’t done in the best interest of students, they are done for money and bragging rights.
  • However, if there is any humor to regarding Baylor not letting those freshmen out of their national letters of intent, it turns out Baylor didn’t file one of them with the Big XII which means he can sign elsewhere.
  • I had no idea the Rangers, of all MLB clubs, hosted the first interleague game.
  • Texas leads nation in teacher-student sexual assaults and relationships – Former U.S. Department of Education Chief of Staff Terry Abbott, now of the Houston public relations firm Drive West Communications, cited research in 2014 showing Alabama with the highest per capita rate, but Texas, at 116 accusations and convictions, leads the United States in such cases. To put it in perspective, Pennsylvania comes in second with 45 cases.
  • Dirk Nowitzki recreates the Rougned Odor punch… with Rougned Odor
  • I saw a neighbor walk the runway on the news last night- Photos: See Cowboys wives, girlfriends down the catwalk at charity fashion show
  • Prayer and religious belief in the US at an all-time low, study claims – The decline in religious commitment was most pronounced among men, Whites, and those in the Midwest, Northeast, and West, and was nearly absent among Black Americans and small in the South. It appears that groups with relatively high social power are less likely to see themselves as having a significant need for religion or God in recent years.
  • They start and end it with an RGIII quote from his Heisman acceptance speech – Letter to the Board, Students, Faculty, Staff, Alumni & Friends of Baylor from Survivors of Sexual Assault – Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4, Page 5
  • FiveThirtyEight – The Sun Is Always Shining In Modern Christian Pop – I took a look at the last five years of Billboard’s year-end top 50 Christian songs to see whether Christian pop is unrelentingly cheerful. I looked at pairs of concepts across the entire collection of lyrics (life and death, grace and sin, etc.) and calculated the ratio of positive to negative words.
  • Father attacks daughter’s killer in court – That was one heck of a leap that father made at the murderer.
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