Looking downriver
Originally uploaded by me.

Just Desserts?

There have been times, in the past, when I've gently teased my friends in California about the dangers of living there. Earthquakes.... wildfires... J-Lo and Ben... California is like disaster central. All we get here are the occasional monster snowstorms, which I find kind of exhilerating, and tornadoes, which are pretty location-specific--you can be right next to one and if it doesn't hit your house, you're fine. We don't really go in for area-effect disasters, usually. But last week and this week have been my comeuppance! They finally issued a voluntary evacuation order for my town last night. Naturally, I didn't go, but was kind of on pins and needles as to whether I'd wake up to Lake Neighborhood this morning. I moved my important papers to the second floor. I called my dad to make sure he'd take in the cats if I had to go. I called Rat Girl, just to jitter at her. I was...well....edgy. ( Of course, the pot of coffee I had around 6 pm might have influenced this as well.)

Today the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the weather is freezing, and the river is apparently at crest right now. As you can see in the photo, it's a bit higher than last week.... Like about 3 feet higher. That's the top of the levee, where the gravel path is. If the water were to rise another 18", it would begin pouring into town like milk into a bowl of Cap'n Crunch--but it's not gonna. I'm pretty confident of this, and the Flood Watch website agrees with me. Our town is safe! Probably! This is not, however, true for the poor bastards who live upriver of us at Ravenswood, who have been at critical flood levels for 2 days. That's part of why we're OK, ironically enough--the more water gushes through the homes and basements of Ravenswood, the less comes around our bend of the river. Frog Hollow, south of us, is under about 3' of water at last count. One hopes the frogs, at least, are happy. If you want to see more flood pictures, check the Flickr account, I've got one that's almost at the same angle as the one I posted last week.... Anyway, holding up, and I promise my next post will be about more fun things. Maybe.