Rain, Rain, Go Away....

... and it finally did, after 3 days.

But not before leading to some flooding. Nowhere near what Ike did down south, but exciting for us nevertheless. We've lived here for 6 years now and never seen anything like this. Usually storms blow in, dump some rain, then blow right out. This was pretty darn near constant rain, from mere misting to incredible downpour, since Friday morning.

Here's a local park, just down the road from our house. Normally it's wide fields, commonly used for sports activities and picnics. As you can see, we weren't the only ones out checking the river.

Later, we went to downtown. Unfortunately it was getting dark, so most of the pictures didn't come out too well, but here are a couple of one the many bridges in downtown. The river runs right through the middle of town and usually there's a lovely walkway on either side and several feet of clearance between the river and the bottom of the bridges -- not today.

There were hundreds of people out this evening checking out the river. There were barriers and warning tape everywhere -- and most of it was ignored (we ignored some, too).

And to top it off, whoever programmed the carillon this evening had a sense of humor. The first 3 songs, in order, were:

• Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
• Old Man River
• Somewhere over the rainbow

It was too funny. Especially since I don't think I've ever actually been downtown before when the carillon is playing.

When I was growing up, we did the same thing -- checking out the flooding when the rivers flooded, as soon as it was safe checking out the fire damage from forest fires, when Mt. St. Helens blew we didn't stay home but headed out to the basin where there was more ashfall. We were always completely safe, but in awe of mother nature. I guess I've instilled that in my children now.

I am incredibly glad the rain has stopped. It wouldn't have taken too much more to cause some real damage in the area.