I hate flooding. I hate water in my house. Unless, of course, it is nicely contained in whatever is supposed to be holding water. The rain gauge holds water. It says 6 inches since last night. It stopped raining at around 3 this afternoon. I waded through the mosquitoes that are hatching out of our GRASS to look at the gauge.
This morning my first clue should have been the toad trying to climb up our window to escape the window well.
He seemed pretty desperate.
The vole, however, should have sent warning bells clanging in my head. He seemed pretty desperate.
It was going in and out of its hole, running around the well, back and forth in the window, and trying to gnaw the window apart to get in. Do you realize how difficult it is to take a decent picture (or any picture) of a crazed vole trying to run for its life?
Here are more pictures of a barely detectable vole in a life and death struggle. Against what? Well, at the time I was blissfully unaware.
More brave but pathetic attempts at snapping a vole in the throes of desperation.BTW, the windows are filthy because the wells keep FILLING UP.
Which led to the devastation in the basement.
That 6 inches? About 2 of them came back into the house.
This morning, when I went down (I had one of those "someone behind me in the dark/shark in the water" feelings) my sewing studio and the poor de-carpeted area were covered in a layer about 1/4 inch deep. Water, with just the right amount of dirt mixed in to make it disgusting.
Later this morning, when the electricity flickered off, and I heard a high pitched squeal continuously, I got another one of those feelings. Watching a sump pump spew water at 10 gallons a minute back INTO THE HOUSE while every window in the basement is gushing INTO THE HOUSE is disconcerting to say the least.
No pictures for that one. Sorry.
I really, really can empathize with all those people whose homes were totally destroyed in the recent flooding. My eldest son kept saying (as he was extracting water from our basement on his day off), it could have been so much worse.
And he's right.
1 comment:
amazing you're able to sound sane with all that. and vole and toad! it's like some sort of wind in the willows meets f.e.m.a.
my heart goes out. as new homeowners (we're new to it. the home is old), nature has become quite a formidable adversary. everything out there seems to have some personal issue with me and my house. a tree looking askance at the roof. a bird who has no business taking parts of whatever it is on my roof she keeps taking. roots growing into the foundation.
i hope you are all okay. i hope toad and vole are doing well.
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