November 5, 2009

mr.unhappyHow Soon We Forget

Seattle, rightfully or wrongly, is known for its rain. When we tell people not from Seattle that we live here, they often ask, “How can you handle all that rain?”

I did research today because I wanted to know…do I live in the rainiest city in the country? This is what I found out…

The 10 rainiest cities in the U.S. by amount of annual rainfall include:

  • Mobile, Alabama–67 inches average annual rainfall; 59 average annual rainy days
  • Pensacola, Florida–65 inches average annual rainfall; 56 average annual rainy days
  • New Orleans, Louisiana–64 inches average annual rainfall; 59 average annual rainy days
  • West Palm Beach, Florida–63 inches average annual rainfall; 58 average annual rainy days
  • Lafayette, Louisiana–62 inches average annual rainfall; 55 average annual rainy days
  • Baton Rouge, Louisiana–62 inches average annual rainfall; 56 average annual rainy days
  • Miami, Florida–62 inches average annual rainfall; 57 average annual rainy days
  • Port Arthur, Texas–61 inches average annual rainfall; 51 average annual rainy days
  • Tallahassee, Florida–61 inches average annual rainfall; 56 average annual rainy days
  • Lake Charles, Louisiana–58 inches average annual rainfall; 50 average annual rainy days

Do you see Seattle on that list? Me either. We only get 32 inches a year, but still people think that Seattle is sokind of wet depressing because of all the rain. The rain doesn’t really get to you. It’s the gray. It’s the cloudy, overcast days that never end. True, we get rain, but it’s rarely that hard rain like you find in the Midwest or that thunderstorm rain of Mobile, Alabama or Miami, Florida. It’s just a steady rain that sometimes blows around when the wind kicks up, but it’s only 32 inches in a year.

Of course, we got that 32 inches today. Or so it felt like it. We started our work at 10:30 this morning and five hours later, three raincoats, two pairs of rain pants, three pairs of shoes, three hats, and a complete change of clothes later, we came home to towel off. It was so bad today I had to wear my dreaded red coat.

shakeThat means it was a wet day. But I’m maturing and only raised a ruckus for about 30 minutes. After that, I was resigned to the fact that I had to wear the coat and just about everyone else we walked today wore one, too.

I’d forgotten how wet these months can be. And now, with the prediction of El Nino, it looks like that red raincoat might be something I’ll have to wear until next July when the sun decides to stick around for longer than 15 minutes.

That’s what happened today. 15 minutes of no rain followed by two hours of rain and then 10 minutes of sprinkles followed by sideways rain. Good thing Gretchen only brushed me out last night and didn’t give me a bath. Heck, she could have bathed me today. Just add a little soap to all those showers falling from the sky and I’d have been a clean man in no time at all.

So while we took some photographs, they were often taken under cover or between raindrops. We were actually looking through the photographs tonight and some were kind of blurry. “Why is that?” I asked Gretchen.

“I think it’s raindrops on the lens,” she sighed.

I think she’s right.

Our day started with Ollie and surprisingly when we set out, it wasn’t raining. Of course, that didn’t last long so Gretchen pulled out my red coat to put on the little boy. Unfortunately (and I mean this in so many ways) the red coat in her backpack was my newer, larger one and well, it looked a bit big on little Mr. Ollie. He didn’t seem to mind too much, though he wasn’t really in the mood for playing in the downpour. Not me, I was all for it because HE was wearing the raincoat and not me!

nocoatnotsomuch

playinghomenow?

We walked back to our house so I could be left to eat my breakfast and he could get the right coat for their walk back to Ollie’s house.

After Ollie came Rosie. Rosie has a coat, but for the life of her, Gretchen always chooses the wrong one to put on her. Whose coat is Rosie’s? Oops, it’s the yellow one, not the green. Actually, the green coat is a little longer in the back and with the skies opening up today, it covered her tail and protected it from the rain.

They walked up the Bradner Gardens where Rosie took cover under the shelter while Gretchen stood outside to get a photo of the wrong-coated girl.

undercoverkindawet

closeup

After Rosie got dried off and taken home, Gretchen swung by Gemma’s house, strapped her into her green coat, and then headed through the park back to our house. I knew I was doomed when I saw hearty Gemma in a raincoat and boy, was I right.

ughmiserable

Gemma and I walked in the rain with me twitching the whole time and Gemma slamming her back end into me wanting to play. It wasn’t playing weather nor was I wearing my play clothes!

We took Gemma home, toweled her off, and then walked up to Alice’s house. Guess what? Yep, she’s got a raincoat too. By then the rain was really coming down so we made our way up to Woobie’s house doing our best to get our business done and not getting too wet. It was hard to do, let me tell you.

Gretchen had the zoom lens on the camera, so she couldn’t get a photo of all three of us taking shelter on Woobie’s porch, but as you can see, Alice was fine just sitting under the roof and not going for any more of a walk.

stay here?let's go

I'm fine

But walk we did and Woobie and I led the way, searching for those squirrels in the park. Can I just say, those little pipsqueaks like to torment me. Just look at him, trying to hide with his gray fuzzy body against a gray rainy sky!

pestgrayman

We took Alice home, toweled her off, too and then Woobie, Gretchen and I headed south to pick up Saber. Woobie gets to go coatless, might I point out, though Gretchen says she lives in a permanent coat under all that hair so we should give her a break.

And Saber? No coat for him, either, but he didn’t seem to mind that it was raining, that I was wearing a coat, or that Woobie had long hair. Nope. Nothing bothers that kid. So we played at the tennis courts and surprisingly, got our 15 minutes of no rain right in the middle.

wetshadowswetwoobie

runningrainchase

new friendspounce

hairgirlget her

tagturning

wetmugstraightup

can'tgetmechaseison

upoffgroundgotya

windy

We walked through the park after that and stopped by the school to see if our student had had a good day. Unfortunately, he had not, but I was kind of glad because our 15 minutes of no rain turned into a downpour more fierce than anything we’d seen that day.

We took Saber home, toweled him off, and then we thought about walking Woobie home. Since she’d been with us for almost two hours, we decided to all pile into the car and drive her back home. I think Woobie really appreciated that. I know I did because my very wet red raincoat got taken off me and I could once again breathe again.

Woobie got toweled off twice, though we’re not sure how much good it did and when I got home, I was toweled off so vigorously I thought we were playing tug of war and got all crazy for a few minutes.

But the one who really needed toweling off was Gretchen. Soaked to the skin, she jumped into the shower then toweled off and put on her favorite sweats and wool sweater so as not to catch a cold. We both ate a filling dinner (thanks Rosie and Tyson’s parents for the delicious salmon!) and are ready to curl up for our nightly massage session. Oh, how I’m looking forward to that!

How soon we forget how much these wet days can take it out of us! Good thing we don’t live and work in Mobile, Alabama!

Until Tomorrow,

Rubin

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