The Calm In Between

Phoenix received a very large amount of rain in the early hours this morning. I woke about 2:30ish and noticed the wind had picked up quite a bit, and that it had started to throw rain. I woke the Wife and mentioned we should get a bucket under a couple spots that leak, but only when it really pours. Glad I did. By the time we got up about 5:30, the rain had been coming down in buckets, and already their were major freeway closures across the Valley. I ran the oldest Son to school, and waited to find out how things were going to go with all the closures.

The Wife called after finding out that the elementary school the youngest goes to, had cancelled school for the day. I had heard also on the radio, there were a couple other districts that had closed as well, though they were more in the SE valley, which I was hearing had had more rain. The middle son, we tried repeatedly to contact the school to see if they were cancelling as well, but gave up. I decided he would just stay home as well. About that time (about 8:30) the Wife got one of them automated messages from the high school, saying they were cancelling as well, and any students already at the school had a chance to catch a bus back to their bus stop, or be picked up. I didn't want the MIL to be out driving in the bad rain, so I picked him up and dropped him off with the MIL, where the other two boys were for the day.

My buddy Don that works at the same company as I, texted me this morning he was not working today. The area he provides service for, was not able to be reached by him due to two of the major freeways on that side of town had closures. I called into work to see what they wanted me to do. My Boss decided that even though there were a number of techs that could not make it to the shop (to get parts/routes) or could not reach their service areas had called in and were not working, but he wanted me to be able to get routes/parts out for tomorrow. Joy. I left my house about two hours early, as I had no idea what to expect on the roads, as well as having to use surface streets, because by this time, ALL freeways had closures at some point(s), and three of them were ones I used on a normal basis. So what normally is about a 45 minute drive, ended up being an hour and a half, but luckily did not have to be detoured around closures/flooded areas.

Aside from being a bit late getting started on my route this evening, after locking all of us employees in the building by accident, most closures had cleared up. I had to do one small detour, but the detour was not out of my way, and it was on the final trek home at the end of the night. Never did get to splash through the big puddles in my box truck (pout).

And now I am just worn out. Between the humidity and being more tense while driving, trying to watch out for stupid people, and plan ahead via the traffic reports to be sure I didn't get caught in something, I am wiped out. Rain for the next two days is expected, though not as much as today.

Phoenix set an official new record for the rainiest day on record. by 6am, the airport had received 3.29 inches, beating the previous record of about 2.94 inches set back in 1933. It rained across most of the valley until 9-10 am. Parts of the valley were reporting up to 6 inches of total rainfall. Yeah, water retention areas were huge lakes. I am sure there will be many warnings about mosquitos and the West Nile virus in the next 2-3 weeks.

Joy.

PeacE