If you like forked lightning, come to Texas. Many years ago I was driving up I-45, between Houston and Dallas in a Mustang convertible. In the middle of a thunderstorm, there was the most almighty crack, the lightning forked above the northbound lane and hit the median and the road sign to my right about 30 feet away. It was a strange, strange feeling, every hair on my body was standing to attention. I don't know what would have happened if it had hit the soft top of that convertible.
I just cut down a 70 foot pine tree, about 100 feet from the house, that was hit by lightning last fall. You could see where the lightning had hit and it blew a 6 inch strip of bark off the trunk all the way to the ground. I thought that the tree might make it but I guess that it was just too much trauma. That's the second tree close to the house that we've lost in the last 10 years.
One thing that I did learn with all our storms though is that some circuits on our old house aren't grounded. They might have 3-prong outlets but there is no ground wire connected. If they get lit up, it doesn't matter if they have surge suppressors or UPS's on them or not, anything plugged into them gets fried. It took me a while to figure it out, and miscellaneous fridges, freezers, printers, radios etc., but I think I've got everything under control now. I've got a whole house surge suppressor on the incoming power and every ungrounded circuit I can find is now grounded. I haven't had a problem for about 3 years .... fingers crossed.
Then there's the friend of mine whose brand spanking new house, he'd only been it it a month, took a direct hit. But that's another story.
