Posts tagged ‘home’

The Ten Year Flood.

When we built our house in 2001, there was this phrase tossed around:  the ‘Ten Year Flood’. Everything had to be built at an elevation to accommodate the ‘Ten Year Flood’, which I assumed to be the highest flood water level that could be imagined to happen.  

We live in a sandy area, relatively low, which often floods slightly when there is a lot of rain. The picture above is the end of our driveway. The past two days, we have had a lot of rain.  We can’t, as of yet, use this entrance to our house.  Our neighbors have experienced a perplexing leak in their basement.  Other neighbors’ driveway washed out.  While there is water standing around where there usually isn’t water, our own house has not been threatened. Even though we did, yes, build our house upon the sand. This is all from a weather system that has been perched over the plains for a few days… before hurricane Ike hit the gulf coast.   The last time a flood of this magnitude hit our area was October 1998. The Ten Year Flood.   That’s a little creepy.

Because on Tuesdays, there are pelicans

You probably are aware that I live in the middle of the country in a state no one ever thinks about (with a few exceptions). For almost 7 years, we have lived on a small lake in the middle of this state in the middle of the country. I knew that living on a lake would bring much water-based recreation into our lives, and would likely bring much sand into our house. Both hunches have proven to be true. What I didn’t know is that, being on a body of water in the middle of some major migratory patterns, we’d get to see some amazing wildlife. In the state that’s in the middle of the country. Today… this is what was on the water just outside our house.

This isn’t a great picture because I don’t own one of those cameras with a lens that has its own atmosphere. I have a point and shoot. Plus, as my son and I walked toward them, they swam away. But this is a picture of 8 white pelicans. Up close they look like this (I didn’t take these pictures…. no, really).

They are HUGE. Some of them even had that crazy beak think going on. Which I learned here means they are males who are, well, searching for that special someone. So there you go.

I’ve been thinking about a weekly blog feature. Perhaps I will do a Waterfowl Wednesdays thing. What do you think?

…and that’s when I heard the angels singing…

We finally got a new dishwasher today. After two months without one. Apparently Amana, while not much for the longevity of appliances, writes a dang good warranty, so the new unit arrived in our home for free (accompanied by celestial vocalizations).

I know that in the larger world view, having or not having a dishwasher is incredibly trivial. And yet, I invite you to join in the rejoicing.

So what was your most recent good-yet-possibly-trivial news?