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Wednesday, May 26, 2021

After the Rains, Wordless Wednesday and Words for Wednesday

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     






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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts to encourage us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    


This month, the prompts are being provided by yours truly.


The whole point is to write and have fun, so please join in, you don't even have to use the prompts if you don't want.  Let them be a springboard, not a straight jacket.


A big thanks to Elephant's Child for allowing me to provide the prompts this month.  Next month, River will be providing the prompts on her blog.     


This week the prompts are:


love

ocean

savor

detail

charge

childlike


and/or


last

broadcast

lick

system

crash

shocking


As i finished my work that Monday, May 17, i went home with no clue about what was to come.  Ms. PA had given me a strict CHARGE to get home before the rain came, but i still needed to go see Ms. S, so i did.


We're used to some stormy weather, after all, and i figured this would be like 'most every other weather SYSTEM we get coming through here:  a CRASH of lightening and a wall of rain to start, tapering off to a steady rainfall for a while, and tapering further until it stopped.


This wasn't going to be one of those, it was going to be a storm that came to town like the bad guys used to ride in thinking to LICK Matt Dillon.  Yes, Ms. S watches old Westerns on TV while i am there some days, can you tell?


For a while even after i got home, there was no rain yet, so i fixed supper and sat down to SAVOR it.  At LAST the rains came, and they were light, then heavy, then light, but not SHOCKINGLY heavy.  


Then radio began to BROADCAST the severe storm alerts that we hear so often we are in danger of becoming jaded and ignoring them.  They are almost always word for word the same, DETAIL after DETAIL.  There will be heavy rain, quarter size hail, damaging winds of up to 60mph, etc.  Watch out for flash flooding, do not drive in deep water, move to an interior room of your home, ad naseum.


As the light faded, i watched as the sky sent down buckets of rain, so much that it was pouring out of the house gutters in sheets.  Every time we thought it was slowing, it would start up again.


This went on for hours.  Every time i got up in the night, it was still coming down, an OCEAN of water that showed no signs of letting up.


At first light i took Coda out, and there was still standing water in the low-lying areas, which i knew was unusual.  Most of the time, it drains off within a couple of hours, and the rain had slacked up about 4 hours prior.


The news was grim, we'd gotten up to 13.75 inches of rain at some of the rain gauges in the area, all in about 5 hours time.


No drainage system can handle that, and ours didn't.


The skies stayed gray Tuesday, but we only got a few drizzles more.  Then it rained more on Wednesday, and even more on Thursday, and Friday saw a bit more.  No huge storms on those other days, just day after day of gray and rain, drizzle, stop, start again, rain, drizzle.


Depending on where you were, you got upward of 18 inches for the week, and this after an April that was twice as wet as usual, and an early May that was no drier.


The Wordless Wednesday photo above shows the results of such rain at only one house.  There are hundreds more like that.


When i went to work on the Monday after, Carl, his CHILDLIKE concern showing through, was talking about all the people whose homes were damaged.  "What do they do?" he asked.  We talked about how churches and charities go in and help them gut their houses and rebuild.


He has so much LOVE for people, that special needs man/child.  He is grieving with those who grieve.


We all are.


May the Lord be close to the broken-hearted.  Our church has already started sending out work crews.  It's all we can do.



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Today is:


Bob Day -- an internet holiday i couldn't confirm, but if your name is Bob, you deserve a special day just for having that name!


Crown Prince's Birthday -- Denmark


Dracula Day -- Bram Stoker's Dracula went on sale this day in 1897


Dzien Matki -- Poland (Mother's Day)


Festival of the Valley -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (celebration of the movement of Amun from the East Bank of Thebes to the West Bank; it involved giving flowers and sharing food with the dead)


Full Flower Moon / Corn Planting Moon / Milk Moon

     Buddha Day/Vesak/Waisak  -- Bhuddist's Buddha Day; date varies with many celebrating tomorrow, and some areas already started the celebrations yesterday; sometimes called "Buddha's Birthday"

     Heavenly Sage Bao Sheng’s Birthday -- Taoism

     Kasone Full Moon -- Myanmar

     Vesak Full Moon Poya Day -- Sri Lanka

     Waisak/Vesak Festival -- Borobudur Temple, Java, Indonesia (on the day of the full moon, a stunning and spiritual celebration of Buddha's birthday)


Goblin Races -- Fairy Calendar


Holiday of the Receiving of Ra -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)


Independence Day -- Georgia(1918); Guyana(1966)


National Blueberry Cheesecake Day


National Cherry Dessert Day


National Day of Healing -- Australia (formerly called National Sorry Day; to express regret for the ill treatment of Aboriginal Peoples of Australia)


National Paper Airplane Day -- not an official holiday, but go make one, and have a blast; some people even organize contests


National Senior Health and Fitness Day -- US (don't let age get in the way of staying healthy! this year the theme is "Life is Better in Motion") 


Prince Jonah Kuhio Kalanianaole Day -- Hawai'i


Sally Ride Day -- US (birth anniversary of America's first woman in space)


St. Augustine of Canterbury's Day (First Archbishop of Canterbury and Patron of England; feast day in the Anglican Communion and most Eastern Churches)


St. Philip Neri's Day (Patron of Gravina, Manfredonia-Vieste-San Giovanni Rotondo, and Rome, Italy; the United States Army Special Forces)


Thargelia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (birthday festival of Apollo and Artemis; through tomorrow, date approximate)


World Lindy Hop Day -- Frankie Manning's birth anniversary    




Anniversaries Today:


Boston University is founded by the Massachusetts legislature, 1869



Birthdays Today:


Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark, 1968

Helena Bonham Carter, 1966

Lenny Kravitz, 1964

Genie Francis, 1962

Sally Ride, 1951

Pam Grier, 1949

Philip Michael Thomas, 1949

Hank Williams, Jr., 1949

Stevie Nicks, 1948

Brent Musburger, 1939

Miles Davis, 1926

James Arness, 1923

Peggy Lee, 1920

Jay Silverheels, 1919

Frankie Manning, 1914

Peter Cushing, 1913

Robert Morley, 1908

John Wayne, 1907

Dorothea Lange, 1895

Al Jolson, 1886



Today in History:


Armenian rebels battle the Sassanid empire and win the right to openly practice Christianity, 451

An earthquake  strikes Kamakura, Japan, killing about 30,000, 1293

Geneva  expels John Calvin and his followers from the city, 1538

Alse Young becomes the first person executed as a witch in the American colonies, 1647

Lewis and Clark first see the Rocky Mountains, 1805

The Indian Removal Act is passed by the U.S. Congress, 1830

Dred Scott is emancipated by the Blow family, his original owners, 1857

The impeachment trial of U.S. President Andrew Johnson ends with Johnson being found not guilty by one vote, 1868

Nicholas II becomes Tsar of Russia, 1894

Charles Dow publishes the first edition of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, 1896

The first major commercial oil strike in the Middle East is made, 1908

The world's longest-lasting tornado, lasting for over 7 hours and traveling 293 miles, strikes Mattoon, Illinois, 1917

British Guiana gains independence, becoming Guyana, 1966

Apollo 10 returns to Earth after a successful eight-day test of all the components needed for the forthcoming first manned moon landing, 1969

The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2, 1970

Willandra National Park is established in Australia, 1972

George Willig climbs the South Tower of New York City's World Trade Center, 1977

A 7.7 magnitude earthquake strikes Japan, triggering a tsunami that kills at least 104 people, injures thousands. Many people go missing and thousands of buildings are destroyed, 1983

The European Community adopts the European flag, 1986

Zviad Gamsakhurdia becomes the first democratically elected President of the Republic of Georgia in the post-Soviet era, 1991

The Supreme Court of the United States rules that Ellis Island, the historic gateway for millions of immigrants, is mainly in the state of New Jersey, not New York, 1998

Sherpa Lakpa Gelu climbs Mount Everest in 10 hours 56 minutes, 2003

The New York Times publishes an admission of journalistic failings, claiming that its flawed reporting and lack of skepticism towards sources during the build-up to the 2003 war in Iraq helped promote the belief that Iraq possessed large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, 2004

The May 2006 Java earthquake kills over 6,600 people, leaves 200,000 homeless, 2006*

The World Health Organization confirms that Ebola has reached Sierra Leone, 2014

Hackers steal personal data for about 100,000 taxpayers after breaking into a U.S. Internal Revenue Service system that allows taxpayers to retrieve previous tax returns; the data can be used to file tax refund claims and commit identity theft, 2015

Ken Wyatt becomes Australia's first Aboriginal minister in government as the minister for indigenous Australians, 2019


*Occurred 22:54 GMT May 26, 05:54 Local Time May 27, so some sources date it today, some tomorrow 

21 comments:

  1. Thank you for the words and your story. It's true about drainage systems, that are fine for decades at a time until that sort of torrential downpour happens. Something to keep in mind when building, make sure the drains can handle floods.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Love your story, and your heart.
    Sorry, but I am simply too tired to play this week. I will however be round to applaud.

    ReplyDelete
  3. What an awful lot of rain. Poor people. And Carl has a big heart for sure.
    On another note; my WfW story is up. Thank you for the words.

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  4. Those poor people! We have also had a tremendous amount of rain this month too, but thankfully no flooding here. The forecasters said that to May 21st we had 185% of our average rainfall for May. We have had 4 more days since then but today is dry but cloudy. It is supposed to continue dry at last. I hope they are right.

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  5. Holy cow, that is a lot of rain! I'm sure many homes can't handle it. Hopefully the rain will stop, and things will be able to dry out.

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  6. Crickey that's awful Mimi and the picture says a lot we have had lots of rain hail and storm here too but nothing like what you have had.

    I hope all is well and help is at hand for all effected

    Have a good week if possible 👍

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  7. Oh my goodness. What a mess. I feel bad for these people. Have a good day Mimi.

    Cruisin Paul

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  8. How horrible. Mother Nature has her own mind about things and she does this all around the world. So sad. Prayers for all those affected.

    Thank you for joining the Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop.

    Have a fabulous Wordless Wednesday. Big hug. ♥

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks Mimi for this month's prompts. Here is my story for today.
    OCEAN VIEW by Granny Annie

    Belinda's behavior was childlike as she stood at the ocean edge. She clapped her hands in glee and wanted to charge into the water but she knew better. She could see the sharks circling. They would love to savor a bite of Belinda. This was an important detail she needed to remember. "Jack!" she murmured to her husband as he approached her, "isn't this just gorgeous?" "Yes, it is" Jack replied, as he stretched his arms out to her.

    --Later that night --

    It was a beautiful evening for the group gathered in their favorite beach bar. They enjoyed the lime margaritas and the lick of salt on their wrists. There was so much laughter they almost didn't hear the shocking news coming over the last evening broadcast. The bar's sound system wasn't very good plus the loud crash of waves also blurred the story. It was something about a tourist named Belinda killed in a shark attack. Her distraught husband had found her. He insisted he had warned her not to go in the water but she never paid attention to him.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's amazing what people will get away with, isn't it. Scary and well told!

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  10. So sad for your weather. I have been see the flooding n the news and glad you have not lost your home. This is climate change...continuing its changes.

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  11. That is just heartbreaking, our prayers go out to all impacted by that terrible storm.

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  12. Oh my gosh- so much rain in so little time....Mother Nature can be so destructive at times. So sad for all those people. Take care.

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  13. That much rain is a horrible nightmare for so many, we're sending prayers to everyone.

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  14. mimi; praying everyone is ok; have been through flooding so I understand; sometimes one wants to cry... but fears it's only going to "add" to the standing water already in place. hoping you all catch a rain break ☺☺♥♥

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  15. That is a lot of rain in a short amount of time. I will pray for all who are affected. XO

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  16. WOW! We have had some bad floods here - luckily not this year. We are praying for the people affected by the rains where you are. Sending you our love and strength! And Carl ROCKS!

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  17. Oh dear, that was a lot of rain. Hope all the affected houses and families will get all the help they need to put things back together again. Carl has a compassionate heart. We just had one heavy downpour after about a week of dry spell. Fortunately, I remember to take in my pillows that I put out in the sun this morning. I was in the nick of time, or else my pillows will get all wet.

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  18. Here I am complaing about the light shower I got caught in earlier thismorning. What a dreadful thing to occur.

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  19. Oh dear ~ prayers and well wishes for all those affected by the rains ~ Xo

    Living moment by moment,

    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

    ReplyDelete

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