So lightning hit the pine tree next to the house yesterday during the insane storm. Left a gash in the tree, and then hopped onto the aluminum ladder for it's trip to the ground. The resulting electromagnetic wave tripped 3 circuits in the new part of the house, and tripped the feed from the main panel to the sub panel in the new part of the house. Not only that, but it also magnetized the CRT monitor in the sunroom. (One corner was green, the other corner was red). I fixed that by running the de-gauss fuction on the monitor, looks fine now.

I was in the Living room when it happened. Let me tell you that thunder was loud. For about 2 minutes the thunder and lightning were simultaneous and constant. Then there was a HUGE *CRASH* !BANG! and through the windows you could smell the electrical burn.

Now for the bad news:
The Surround Sound receiver and the Xbox are dead. They just don't work anymore. There's no detectable damage to either one. No smell, no charring, no popped capacitors nothing... The xbox was even plugged into a surge protector. The only common element is that they were both on the same shelf, but they weren't touching each other, nor were their cords touching each other. Everything else on the surge protector is fine, and the surge protector hadn't even been tripped. The outlet the receiver was plugged into has no damage to it, and still works fine.

So it's kind of a mystery, and expensive mystery... sigh... I'm hoping that the power cord (which has the step down transformer) got fried, and that a new one ($3.95) will fix it. I'll be testing that this afternoon.

Once the internet connection is back (the DSL got knocked out too) I'll post the pictures of the tree I took. Pieces of bark, and wood are lying 30-40 feet from the base of the tree...

Oh, and there's a Woot-off going on right now at woot.com. which is why my mood is woot / glum

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