Rain

Back in 2013, I said this:

Once upon a time,  long, long ago, in a country far far away ...

... I spent some time living on the edge of a desert during a prolonged drought.  Day after day after day dawned with blue skies and perpetual sunshine. It never rained, not even a little bit. You might find this hard to believe, but ongoing, unbroken blue skies and a complete dearth of rain become very dispiriting and rather boring. And if you rely on lake, river and rain water for your supplies, a complete lack of rain also gets quite worrying.  I kept the garden alive by putting the washing water from the washing machine on to it.  Rinsing water became the next cycle's washing water. We became very creative and resourceful in our use of water.

Then, one day, the drought broke.  I remember very vividly when it started to rain.  I happened to be out in the depths of the countryside visiting someone and remember quite clearly turning round and looking for the idiot who had put a sprinkler on their garden.  Austin, on the other hand, who must have been only two or three, had screaming hysterics because he, of course, had no memory of ever having felt water falling out of the sky before.

I vowed and declared that I would remember this experience and that I would remain perpetually grateful for the gift of water. In short, that I wouldn't ever complain about the rain again.

And by and large I don't complain much about the weather, if for no other reason than that there is absolutely nothing that I can do about it so it is a complete waste of time and breath complaining about it.

It is, however, perfectly possible to have far too much of a good thing! Far, far too much.

We were warned in Victoria earlier in the week to prepare for a Major Rain Event and for potential flooding. It was suggested that people should make sure that they had at least three days of supplies at home.

It was reiterated, over and over and over again, that YOU MUST NOT ATTEMPT TO DRIVE OR WALK ACROSS FLOODED ROADS (this doesn't stop people, who end up being washed away,  stuck, or worse).

I made sure that I had plenty of supplies. I must admit that I wasn't expecting to be flooded, and we weren't. But many roads in and around Ballarat were. And there was a lot of water lying on the roads. There are parts of the state, including some parts of suburban Melbourne, which are inundated by swollen rivers, overflowing dams and overflow water.

Lindsey and Ian's back garden had many deep puddles. Hugo refused to go out for a wee for nearly 20 hours. We had no torrential rain in Mount Helen, just a very great deal of steady and heavy rain. On the whole, we were lucky. 

My garden rain gauge, for the 24 hours from 9:00 on Thursday morning read 42 cm. This is a lot of rain!

Yesterday was damp, overcast and cold.

Today, in Mount Helen, it is sunny, the sky is blue, it's (relatively) warm and the cats are sitting outside in the backyard, lying in pools of sunshine rather than pools of water.

The rivers are still rising around the state and there is a very great deal of ground water. But I think the Rain Event has stopped. For now.

Rupert and Hugo in their backyard, on Thursday:

Lindsey's photo