High Rise

The rains stopped around 2:15pm, and Joe's boss turned up about 20 minutes ago to take him in to work, so I put on my trenchcoat and my combat boots and went out with my camera on my own solitary disaster safari. And remarkably my area appears to have suffered the least of it compared to everywhere else in Hampton Roads from what I've been seeing on the news. I did manage to snap a few shots of what was as of yesterday the shallow ditch-like creek behind my townhouse complex.

When we first moved into our townhouse this spring Joe was a little concerned about the creek behind our townhouses flooding during hurricanes. "It would never happen." I assured him, "The banks are too high and the creek ends just to the left of us anyway." Boy, did I ever eat my hat. And this wasn't even a real hurricane-level deluge, either. I don't wanna imagine. But look at the tops of the little trees poking up over the surface!

See how far up the water came behind our back yards? The levels are already starting to recede (until high tide comes in a little later) but you can see the brownish ring where it stopped for awhile, and yuck, all the garbage that's been sitting at the bottom. No wonder the ducks over there on the right are staying out of it.

More over on the right side. Again, you can see the submerged treetops. It's kinda spooky, actually, standing out there in the eerily silent late afternoon, with just the sound of the ducks and the wind flapping my coat. All I keep thinking about is what if we get another Isabel-sized storm in the next few months? Holy guacamole.

More garbage on the right bank. The water was running back into the ditch even as I was snapping the pics, so the fact that it drains fast is a good sign. Boy, that was one ticked off egret.

The community pool directly behind my back yard faired better than I imagined. I think I was more worried about flooding from that than I was about the creek. Funny how the deck chairs are still perfectly symmetrical to each other.

Joe's car is back home but the front seat floor has several inches of water in it. Anybody know how to dry up somethin' like that? Can I, like, turn the vacuum cleaner in reverse and blow dry that sucker?