Monday, September 15, 2008

The Grass Is Always Greener

Especially after 4-5 inches of rain ... in just a few hours. On top of a few inches 48 hours before that.

The good news: my yard is SO lush and green! The mother can't stop saying how nice it looks. I'm very glad I got it mowed Saturday, otherwise we may be talking jungle out there. The bad news: Step on it and you'll sink faster than in quicksand. I made the mistake of stepping on the edge as I deposited the last of the trash at the alley this morning. ACK! A mere step and my whole foot was nearly gone. Mud city, man. Think I should open a spa? People pay good money to have that crap slapped all over 'em.

Things are slowly drying out though the Mississippi is on the rise again. So much so, that the commemorative statue of explorers Lewis and Clark along the banks of the St. Louis landing that normally looks like this





instead looks like this today -- and the river won't crest until Thursday! While we aren't set for rain this week, if it rains upstream, it will surely go well above the 11 feet over flood stage. I'm thinking that hat will disappear soon and the banks will soon reclaim the adjacent Leonor K. Sullivan Blvd. as it did earlier this summer.

The weatherman said today that as of right now, this is the seventh wettest year on record with more than 50 inches of precipitation to date. We're on track though to have the wettest year ever. We only need four more inches. I'm OK with that.

Just as long as it doesn't all come at once again ...

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Holy cow! You'll have to change the blog name to "This Damp House" :-) Glad to hear you're OK.

Liz said...

Oh my gosh! Your pictures really paint a picture of how much rain came down and the damage it's done. I'm so happy you and your new brick path didn't get washed away.

MonkeyGirl said...

He looks like he is waving for help! Awesome pic!

NV said...

Well guys, my prediction came to pass. On the way home tonight, the river has indeed reclaimed the adjacent street. You can still see the hat -- or you could around 5:30.
It will be interesting to see where it is tomorrow. Won't be able to stand on Leonor K to shoot anything though!

Anonymous said...

I just can't fathom all of that water. Maybe it's because it's super hot and dry as could be here. It does flood very easily though, because the ground is so hard that when we do get a lot of rain it doesn't absorb at all. Just makes lovely mud-slides! Hope it dries out soon...

Vicki said...

That statue is a great marker for the water depth, although I'm sure the city planners never meant it to be that way. Or did they?

Take more pictures of it throughout the week!

Ann said...

Holy HECK, that statue! Unreal!

NV said...

kspin -- It was a LOT of water. And I can relate to the mud after yesterday's lil incident. But it IS slowly drying out. I walked across the yard tonight and DIDN'T sink!

V -- I'm not sure if that was part of the plan. They ARE in a boat and as long as the river doesn't drown them, it looks pretty cool, like they're floating the boat. I'm going to try to keep taking pictures at least this week. Thursday into Friday is the crest.

Ann -- Yeah. It's pretty unreal. Especially when you consider that the statue is TWICE lifesize.