A storm rolled in the other evening after a fairly uneventful few days on the weather front. The wind picked up quite a bit and the lightning was nearly constant. I ran to brush my teeth before the storm got too close so I didn’t get electrocuted in the event that lightning struck my apartment. Granny always warned me about this as a child. Maybe it was just her way of getting me to brush my teeth…
With minty fresh breath, I decided I was going to capture some of this lightning with my iphone. I’m sure my real camera would have been great for this…if I knew how to take night pictures and set it to rapid-fire mode.
I swear that by the time my camera is outdated I will have learned how to use it.
Most of my pictures turned out like this one: completely dark like any run-of-the-mill night sky. I had about 89 of these.
Then I had several like this one as the lightning’s impact started to fade.
I believe that is a chunky bolt of lightning there on the left.
This appears to have been lightning striking on the other side of my apartment building, which means the storm was right over my head as I was snapping these shots. This is such a creepy photo.
And this one is even creepier. The sky is light as if it were 2:00PM, but the parking lot on the bottom left reveals that it’s actually 11:30 PM. Bizarre.
My slower reflexes and then my iphone’s delay in taking the pictures meant that many of my pictures that I thought would have lightning strikes in them turned out like this one.
And then I got the money shot. According to my calculations, this bolt struck less than a mile from my house.
Yikes!
After that, I decided I should retire my camera phone for the evening and step away from my sliding glass door on my deck.
As I was getting ready to go to bed, I had my blinds closed completely and I could still see the extremely bright flashes of light come through as lightning struck.
Intense.
Y’all be careful,
Sugarlump
The Sugarlump 
Very cool photos!
thanks! I was so excited to have captured the lightning!
That was pretty cool. One day I was driving in a storm and it was strange because it was clear right above me in a circle and everywhere else it was pouring. The lighting stuck in a circle. I wish I could have video-ed.
If you like to read funny satire and don’t offend easy, come check out my blog. I would love it 🙂
Your grandmother’s advice must have saved millions of people. In my four decades in the news business, I’ve never once heard of someone being struck by lightning while brushing teeth.
Or while taking a bath or a shower or …
But I would be more careful using anything electronic to photograph lightning. That’s where you might consider going back to film. Without a flash, naturally.