Three bricks. Rainwater. Broken glass. Christmas clementines. These are vomited across our limestone floor.
Yes! Praise be! It’s the 16th anniversary of MY TORNADO HELL.
Thank you, thank you, anonymous person who turned that long-deleted piece into a permanent memorial.
The glass roof of the side-return exploded, tinkling down from the ceiling like sharp raindrops.
Suddenly I glanced out of the window. ‘Oh my God,’ I said, standing up. ‘Oh my God,’ I said into the phone. Obviously there’d been a terrorist bomb.
A dog called Douschka, a couple “told to throw away all their possessions”, and “A Toyota halved by a concrete lintel” also appear.
Is this a tiny bit mean of me? Yes. But a follow-up piece six months later — Tornado Alley: the final fallout — describes the response to the original article as “internet terrorism”, which assuages my guilt a little.
More recently in this genre, you may also enjoy the tale of the people who, during Covid lockdowns,
gave up one spare room to bring our nanny into our South Kensington home
and found home-schooling went much better if you hired tutors for £65–95 an hour.
