And to think I thought there was no irony here. It was only a couple short months ago, during the overheated election, when every local Tom, Dick and Harry running for office was demanding MORE WATER!
We needed more water!
We deserved more water!
We were going to get more water, one way or another.
Well, we got it - a year's worth of water in 48 hours.
Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?
This city is used to measuring rain in hundredths of an inch, so this series of storms has really thrown everyone for a loop. It appears Bakersfield isn't as flat as I thought. Turns out there are some low spots. Or rather, there were... they're underwater now. I'm not sure what the city plans to do about it. The City manager declared a state of emergency and said the storm had "exceeded our functional capabilities".
I'm not even going to touch that one.
Hopefully those neighborhoods will drain, eventually. If not, the city will probably just tell everyone to go out and enjoy brand new "Lake Bakersfield" and call it a day.
It's amusing to see how unfamiliar the locals are with the concept of real rain. Outside one grocery store a handwritten sign warned...
"CAUTION: RAIN MAY MAKE WALKWAY WET!"
"May"?
Is there some sort of new "dry rain" I'm unfamiliar with?
On the local weather report, the "Chief Meteorologist" suggested that if you approach an intersection with three feet of standing water in it, don't attempt to cross it. That seems pretty self evident to me, but then I'm not from here. He ended with a cheery...
"Turn around. Don't drown!"
I like it. It's kind of pithy. Reminds me "Give a Hoot, don't pollute!"
And then there was the tragic story of a family whose basement had flooded. They had an older home with a full-on, old school basement. As the water encroached on the house, they noticed water coming into the basement. They watched it creep up inch by inch for hours until it finally reached the ground floor and they fled the house. They were standing on the sidewalk in tears when the reporter interviewed them...
"And now Christmas is ruined. All the Christmas gifts were in the basement..."
And there was a shot of a Xbox console, floating near the rafters of the basement.
I don't mean to be rude, or kick someone when their down, but let me see if I understand this correctly.
You stood there watching the basement flood.
Inch by inch.
For hours.
And nobody thought to run down there and rescue the Christmas gifts?
What? You were afraid the kids were going to see them unwrapped and know what they were getting? I'm pretty sure they wouldn't care, because now they're going to get... nothing.
We have two, maybe three more days of this, and it can only get more entertaining.
