But naturally since there's traffic you have to add a good twenty minutes at bare minimum to the Mapquest directions, so it ended being about fifty minutes there. A half hour, plus traffic.
While we were in our appointment, the storm struck. A severe storm, that dropped more than two inches of rain in less than an hour. We were lucky enough (or not) to get out of our appointment at the height of the rain. Since the truck was parked right around the corner from the entrance we decided to run for it. It was heavy rain, but it didn't look too bad. We aren't afraid of a little wet. Halfway across the lot (which was about a thirty foot stretch from door to truck) I stepped in a wash of water up to my ankles. The parking lot was flat, with no dips in the asphalt. It was just a river running across it. Three steps later and a gust of wind blew a wall of water sideways over my entire body. I couldn't have been wetter unless I had jumped in a pool.
That was the start. Out in the street it was bad, and it got worse. Traffic was bumper to bumper and half drowned. It was moving at less than 5MPH. At first it was just us and everyone else trying to survive the drumming rain. Then, someone's car overheated in the lane ahead of us. We shifted to the right and crawled on. Then, someone else's car just stalled in the middle of the street. We shifted again and crawled on.
It took us an hour and a half to make two miles, and in the last bit of those two miles, the police blocked off two of the three lanes because a huge lake had swallowed half the block. There was uprooted bushes, bricks and loads of dirt everywhere. I've seen street flooding before, or thought I had, until this. Luckily we were in the truck, but at times I was doubtful we could even make it in that.
Yes that guy is up to his knees in water.
Did I mention we still had our kids to pick up from their day camp? We were nearly an hour late, but luckily the counselors were having their weekly staff meeting and were cool with it.
Apologies for the blur, it was a camera phone and we were moving, just a bit. That's two swamped lanes of road, looking across to the house. The police blocked off this stretch.
Even after we made it on to the highway we saw a stalled semi in the middle lane, a stalled van a guy was trying to roll off to the side with help, and another two or three cars to the sides with hazards on. It was a wet war zone out there.
Thankfully we all made it home in one piece, a little waterlogged and stressed out, but otherwise safe. The flash flood warnings coming from the Weather Channel app all helpfully said DON'T DROWN. Y' think?
Anyone know how to build an ark?
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