Tornado warnings

There were tornado warnings all over our area this evening, and the last I heard 8 had actually touched down with some damage to barns and houses but no loss of life.  I am reminded of a buyer I worked with some years ago who was moving to Fort Wayne from California.  She was deeply afraid of the idea of tornadoes, insisted on buying a house with a basement (never a bad idea) and wouldn't believe me when I told her I had lived here in the mid-west almost all of my life and had never actually seen one in real life. My father, who lived all his life in this same area remembered seeing a tornado when he was three years old. That was the only time. I don't mean to downplay tornadoes, they can be very destructive, but when I compare them to the flooding in Baton Rouge or the earth quake earlier today in Italy, or the fires in California, I think I'll stay right here.