CULTURE/SOCIETY: Which Is Taller? The Flood Waters Or The Tales?

This is from me, not reprinted from somewhere else.

What?! A new blog from me?! Sorry folks, I'm busy. Don't expect too many blogs from me for a while. - OlderMusicGeek

Well, it looks like it's flood times here in my home town.

My first clue was when my daughter woke me up one in the morning, cus someone was pounding on our apartment door. When I got to the door, I felt a wet squish under my feet.

And when I opened the door, there was a neighbor in shorts and a t-shirt, telling we're flooding.

I look around and there's two inches of water in an apartment hallway!


My daughter and I grabbed all the towels we can find and lay them by our apartment door to try to keep more water from leaking in. We run around like maniacs taking everything off the floor, including our computer and all the plugs and wires to it!

Then I check to see if anyone called the management company that owns our building. The maintenance man is there fairly quickly, but the wet vac he has ain't doing much good. Fortunately, a pump is brought over quickly.

Other people in the basement are talking about their bathtubs backing up. I go look and sure enough, brown water is coming up and water is leaking from the bottom of my toilet!

Eventually, the storm passes our town and I sleep. Well, cus of the overflow, some of the sewer pipes were closed. Soon as they're opened, we start flooding again.

And I had put all our wet towel in the bathtub - which has backed up again, covering them with brownish water!

Fortunately, our maintenance man has things under control this time.

And they bring a wet vac later to help dry the carpet. And in a couple of days, it dries out.


But then a bit later, I wake up from a nap to a storm. I quickly get and look out the door!

Yep, two inches of water in the hallway. I call the management company. Then put on my rain poncho and head to our maintenance man's apartment. He meets me on the way, driving with the stuff in his truck.


And today, they are sandbagging downtown, cus they are releasing a bunch of water from our dammed lake.

This makes rumours run wild!

Fifteen years ago, floods overran our water treatment center and the city didn't have water for two weeks! (A link to an article in my home town paper about the flood.)

So anyway, this the downtown river cresting, bridges being sandbagged, downtown worker being sent home, people began to panic.

My cubicle row at work spent the last hour talking about how the heard from someone who heard from someone that the water was being turned off for 24 hours. There was, of course, nothing on the news on the radio. So I continued doing my overtime.

At 4:40 pm, I got an email saying the water was being turned off - in capital letters - "NOW". Four and a half hours later, the city's water is still running!


I have to admit that I probably take these things easier than others in my hometown, because when they were going 2 weeks without water and a while without electricity, I was living in a 2-room building made of sandstone bricks with a tin roof that had no electricity or indoor plumbing, and did so for 2 years. - I was teaching in Africa. - And part of this was during a drought when water was low.

So no water or electricity is a nuisance to me, but not something to panic about!


You know, I used to feel upset about missing an important part of history in my home town and my home state. But if this is the way people were acting 15 years ago, I'm kinda glad I was in Africa.

I can assure you, they weren't going this crazy about the drought. They just did what they had to do, and that was that. Maybe we need to send some southern Africans over here to help out!