Big Fat Rainstorm, Calm, Big Fat Windstorm.

After school, during my meeting today it was raining so hard, it was amazing. People's basements flooded all over the place.

There was a calm, and I went to A's for book club. I hadn't read the book, but I was bringing the wine, so I didn't want to flake. I was worried, though, when H's text message said that water was coming into her office.


So I left book club early to come check on my place. I made the mistake of taking the Alaskan Way Viaduct home, and got stuck in stadium traffic. I don't want to be too hard on the off-duty cops who direct traffic, but they totally stopped 1st Avenue S traffic for 30 minutes to let out the Seahawks fans. I was actually stuck on the Viaduct offramp, and so traffic stopped behind me, all the way onto the Viaduct itself. It seems to me that Viaduct traffic should take precidence over parking lot traffic.


When I got to the intersection, the traffic cops had a good two mintues of nobody moving. They let traffic go one way, and weren't paying attention and didn't realize there was nobody coming. So I waited at the line for two minutes. Then finally they waved in the oncoming traffic.... and never waved us on! I waited, as did the guy in the next lane, but it looked like both traffic cops on different sides of the intersection were chatting with other people, and had forgotten to wave our direction. Screw that. So I went, and everyone followed me.


It took me an hour to get home from Ballard.



Well, the eye of the storm is passing now; it's not raining so much at this moment, but the wind is shaking the house. And it's loud. Hood Canal and 520 bridges are closed; I-90 will close when windspeeds hit 65mph. I've never seen this kind of wind before. Schools are closing all over the place, but so far not in the city. Power is winking, but so far hasn't blacked out.


Remember the leak in the basement that they never fixed? Well, it's back. That lawyer woman who told me to hold tight until the lawsuit was done, and then wait until the HOA construction was done, I'm sure she's very smug in her smug little house. I hope she wakes up covered in ants. The carpet is soaked in that corner.


The good news? My new couch has arrived. It's a bummer that there's now a wet spot in the corner of that room. Grrr!

Sunday Afternoon: House is Still Clean

So I indeed scouted that church I was talking about; it was BIG and way out there. There was carpet on the floor, which I think helps the sound in a amphitheater-style church. The piano sounded WET, but I was told they don't start doing music for real until next week.

Of course I saw A's sister, brother-in-law, and nephew. The priest was a Jesuit who celebrates his 73rd birthday on Wednesday. The Gospel was the one about how the disciples didn't wash their hands as per Jewish law. During the homily, Father Birthday told an admittedly far-fetched anecdote about how a Rabbi who landed in jail once had to be taken to the hospital for dehydration because he used his water ration for ritual cleansing instead of drinking. We were supposed to snicker about the Rabbi who risks his own health for the sake of ritual, but I was snickering at the racist law enforcement who don't respect the cultural and religious differences of their clients.

I'll go again next week to see if I want to apply for the director job.

So yesterday A was looking for a parking spot near Tutta Bella, and J and I pointed out that she had just passed a spot, the last spot before the intersection. (btw, some neighborhood intersections in Seattle have a big round planter in the center, making an instant traffic circle).

So upon seeing the parking spot, A put on the brakes and waved the traffic behind her. A very angry motorcycle rider then started yelling at her, calling her very bad names for having stopped in front of him at an intersection; legally, by the way... an intersection in Seattle without stop signs is a four-way stop! So anyway, Angry Biker is so mad and he keeps swearing at A, and I'm starting to get mad, but then I remembered my recent renal biopsy, and I pictured my sister lecturing me about getting into a fight the day after getting my kidneys tagged. So wisely, J said, go go go, and A stepped on the gas, as Angry Biker falls off his bike.

So let's recap; Angry Biker is in the intersection, under his bike, cursing A for stopping legally.

We parked somewhere else, laughed smuggly, and then forgot all about him.