Hugs from the Loch Ness Monsters

About half an hour ago I heard a loud thunderclap and it started to rain.

Side note: That sentence drives me nuts because it contains no antecedent to the pronoun 'it.' One of the biggest things I learned in English class was that every pronoun must have an antecedent (word it replaces). I used to always write 'There is,' 'there was,' etc.--not anymore. But I'm stumped about the weather sentences. What can I say? The sky started to rain? The weather started to rain? That sounds ridiculous.

I've got it!

About half an hour ago I heard a massive thunderclap. Soon thereafter, precipitation drenched the earth (so that sounds goofy too, but you know what I mean).

The rain was blowing down sideways, and I was worried about all my little plants. Some of them are really small, so I thought they might be broken. The rain was still coming down (hey, that phrase works too!), but I didn't hear thunder so I ventured out to survey the damage. My garden is across the street, so I carefully hopped through the puddles in my very leaky garden shoes (that is, after all, the reason why they're garden shoes). I was pleased to see that all the plants had recieved a healthy drink and were surviving beautifully.

I turned around to go home, and I saw Camila and Lucy, two of the neighbor girls, walking down the street. They were unbelievably wet and dripping. They looked like they had been dragged up out of the bottom of Loch Ness. I was amazed--I was a little wet, but not like that! They walked over to say hello. Suddenly, Camila lunged at me and gave me a huge wet hug! I thought it was really funny--I was wearing old clothes anyway, so I let Lucy hug me too. They slogged their dripping way home, and I danced once again through the puddles and into my home. If I wasn't going to church tonight, I'd go for a wet walk too. I love this rain!