DH just emailed me this shot – It’s the unhappy Goddess (like you couldn’t tell from my expression) during the forced evacuation on April 18.  The water depth here was very shallow; you can tell by comparing the level on the mail box to  the stop sign in the background.  Our house is to the left, and can’t be seen.  

To truly appreciate these pictures you have to Imagine all the floors and stairs covered with wet and dried sewer sludge.  Same with most of the canned goods and laundry bottles.  Most of the laundry bottles are still grimy, but they’re certainly not a priority.  In the last picture you can see the rack of wine – mostly Yellow Tail – that survived the mass destruction.

Just keep saying: It’s only stuff…

Okay, it only took eight feet of disgusting sewage water and approximately 175 black garbage bags, but channel 7 made the mistake of driving down my street this afternoon.  Same thing with the Daily Herald (photo 2) photographer.  That’s DH doing his “I’m a little teacup” impression.  Leah Hope from Channel 7 wore her hair in a cool roll that she obviously gave up on for the final shot (it was getting windy).

An extreme-couponing wife trying to salvage as much of the basement stockpile and family possessions as is humanly possible versus a DH who looks upon a flood as a shopping experience.

1. I didn’t have to defrost and clean my two upright freezers.
2. Ditto with the two refrigerators.
3. You discover your true friends and those who are only sycophants.
4. You realize that it is possible to get tired of Egg Macs and hash browns for breakfast every friggin’ day!
5. You will not have neighbors for a minimum of 3-6 months for about 400 feet north and 160 feet south of your house. That’s kind of a draw.
6. You finally convince DH to get a small canister vacuum to replace the GIANT YELLOW DYSON that weighed approximately 274.8 pounds. And even more when wet…
7. HE machines are designed for people who either do only one load of laundry a day or have a maid to run the damned things. Seriously, I’m saving energy and water but there is no value placed on the little woman’s time…big grrrrr
8. Going weeks without a pedicure makes it hard to pull your feet out from under the covers in the morning. You have to squint and shove ’em in slippers real fast. shut up, rachel…
9. Friends and co-workers of DH have given us a ton of gift cards … and we have no time to use them.

This just appeared last night at the back porch door.  Floods is s c a r y!  course it could also be a sign from above that I need to order Big Fish tickets… (sorry it’s so dark, but it was night – fish was over two feet long – larger than our dogs)

It’s a very slow, labor-intensive process, picking out the cans, jars and bottles that might be salvageable. Doesn’t help when there are so many scavengers, gawkers and solicitors wandering around. Yesterday DH and I had to file a police complaint against one real estate agent who was supposedly “helping” the Boy Scouts (who have done a tremendous job, by the way) distribute cleaning supplies but was handing out her business card. She kept walking around our property, even after DH politely asked her to leave – twice! He left to run some errands and when he returned she was just driving away down the street. So from now on there always has to be someone at home willing to hit 911. The police told us to post No Trespassing signs – anybody comes on the property can be arrested. This is so sad that 99% of the community organizations are going overboard to help flood victims and the vultures latch onto them.