Rain

The weather here continues to fascinate me. The rain, the heat, the humidity. It is getting warmer. In a few short weeks it has gone from being too cold to eat outside to too hot. Restaurant patios have a very short window of operation here. There are a few crazies that are out there, eschewing the AC, in the 90 degree heat. Probably the same loonies who run at mid-day in August. It's like they have a death wish. Or at least a heat stroke wish.

During the week it seems to get hotter and hotter as the days go by. And the hottest time of the day is around five or six in the evening. I guess with no ocean to cool things off it makes sense. Also, the buildings and the pavement absorb all the heat and re-radiate it. The 'heat island' effect. But my neighbourhood is all trees and it still stays warm well into the evening and even the early hours of the next day.

A typical pattern is ever increasing temperatures throughout the week, then big thunder storms just in time for the weekend. Most of Georgie's Saturday soccer games have been cancelled due to rain. One theory I have heard is that all the pollution from the commuters builds up the particulates in the atmosphere and "seeds" the clouds. So, you get more rain near the end of the week.

Last night we had a big thunder storm. I was sleeping and I remember the start of the rain. Not rain like I am used to. I've never experienced rain like this. And I am from a rain forest. It really should be called a drizzle forest. No, this is real rain. It rains so hard that it wakes you up, it disrupts your thoughts, it keeps you in your house or your car, it causes accidents, washes away roads and cars and people. Back home rain is an annoyance. Here it is a worry.

After the rain came the thunder and lightning. They call it an electrical storm. I was aware of the flashes of light in our room, followed closely at random intervals by the thunderclaps. It seemed to go on forever. I kept trying to go back to sleep. Sometimes so close it rattled the windows. Then it would move off and I could here only the distant rolling thunder. Not such a crash, more like a far away rumble. Now I can go back to sleep, I thought, but then it would come back and shake the house again. I don't know how the girls slept through all that.

Ray at the coffee shop said his rain guage registered 5 inches overnight. And he pointed out that his guage wasn't one of those cheap ones. Nashville, not that far away, got 13 inches. They are literally underwater. The rain stopped just in time for me to take the girls to school. Then I went to the driving range with Jim. It was better than usual since it was flooded and it was fun hitting balls into the new lake.

A few nights ago the power went out. There was a loud explosion sound (blown tranformer?) and then it went dark. Both Elise and Georgie started crying. I went and picked them up, Superdad-style, one girl in each arm. (Georgie told me recently that I am the strongest man in Atlanta, so that's another thing I have going for me). Gudrun came in to hug the little girls but it was pitch black and she couldn't see a thing. I had already stood up with them in my arms so instead she hugged my legs. I almost fell over.

We all huddled in our room with candles. The girls actually fell asleep in our bed and Gudrun and I slept in the guest room. I moved them back to their rooms at 3 am. Elise recounted the story the next day: "It was dark and it went boom!"

Before the rain, the girls and I, and Chris and his little girl, Magnolia enjoyed a Sunday afternoon in the Georgia wilderness. We hit the interstate at 9 am, heading up the GA 400, and then US 157 to Amiacalola State Park, near Dawsonville. It is a lovely wooded area around a waterfall and river. The girls had a great time. It was a wildlife bonanza. We saw a number of caterpillars. Really big fuzzy guys. Also we saw a stick bug and some hawks. Five possums too, but they were all dead on US 157.

There was a long wooden staircase beside the water fall. It has 650 steps. The trip down was easier than the return, but still not easy carrying a 30 pound chimp on my back. On the way back up, Elise was in the backpack carrier, poking me in the neck with a stick. I asked her to please not do that. "Ohhhhh-kaaayyyy!" Then a few minutes later, poke, poke, poke. "Stop that!" "Ohhhh- kaaaayyyy!"

Georgie hiked the whole way back up and Elise entertained us with her broadway-style songs. "Whenever I want to do, I want to do what I want to do" and "You and I and I and you" are her current favourites. At the songs' big moments, she has her arms outstretched and looks to the sky. She really knows how to bring it on home.