Prepare the ark

From this past Friday to late Monday it rained. The next town over got 7 inches. Mind you before the rain, all the snowpack had melted and the rivers and streams were full or were already flooding. I ventured out on Saturday afternoon and it was not nice. Wind gusts up to 50 mph, nonstop horizontal rain, and umbrellas were mostly inverted. Branches had fallen on powerlines and lake sized puddles were already invading the road I hunkered down at home and relaxed. Then a knock comes at my door at 10:30 pm. I'm in my pjs and see that there's some sort of commotion going on in the basement. I then see that there's an inactive pump and the basement is flooded. It's never happened while I lived here, but I had seen evidence that the basement had been flooded before. I slap on one of my 4 pairs of rubber knee boots with pjs and scope out the situation in my individual basement. Thankfully it wasn't completely flooded and I rolled up the carpet and lifted anything that could be damaged off the ground. But the trough around the perimeter of the basement was full of water and overflowing onto the floor. I had an inch or so in spots. My neighbors were less fortunate since their basements were jammed full of junk that doesn't do well in water.

The maintenence guys then make an appearance and I still don't fully understand the situation. I really can't blame then since they were soaking wet even with rain gear. I also don't recommend using a towel as a rain hat. Point being was that they thought it was pointless to pump the basement since water just keeps coming in. But that they would come around and pump if the water got too high. Thankfully by morning the water had mostly drained or had been pumped and only a puddle was left in my basement. It's still very damp down there and my dehumidifier is making a rare spring appearance. It's all so strange since I've never even had a drop of water down there during large rain events. Not sure why it was an all or nothing situation.


On sunday afternoon, I just had to get out of the house and run some errands. Very quickly I realize that most of the next town over is under water. Here's some shots I took today (Tuesday) and water has dropped enough that they are allowing cars on the main road.

The below road is still undriveable, but it makes a good rafting spot. That's a raft in the middle of the road there.

Here's another road closed. It sure makes you figure out new ways to get around.
Of course I have a ton of field work to do in this town, but it just going to have to wait under the water goes down.

Snowicane

Update: I really thought the snow would be over and I'd be sitting in my office, not home again. Looks like we've got over a foot and it keeps coming down. My parking area and sidewalks have not been plowed since they won't do that until the storm is over. With the winds, there's lot of drifts. Here's some new pics.

Day 1 below

Snowpocalypse, Snowtorious B.I.G., Snowmageddon, and Snowicane are all new snow terms I learned this winter. Last fall, I had a feeling this winter would be bad and purchased 2 pairs of wintry type snow boots. So here I am looking at snow storm part 1 zillion. After taking work home all week, it finally materialized. Mind you the daily weather report this week has been 2 to 4 inches of snow every night. But it never seemed to really happen until today. Of course there's been a battle between the raging snow storm and the above freezing temperatures. The result is a slushy disgusting mess in the parking lot. I'm off the check the mail in my rubber knee boots before the reported hurricane force winds should kick in. Is it spring yet? Time to grab the nearest groundhog and interrogate 'em.

NOLA last chapter

Here's the last chapter of my BR/NOLA trip from last month. Two things I wanted to see on my visit were the plantations and the above-ground graveyards. Neither of those exist back home so I tried to see as much as possible. We cruised some graveyards in NOLA and the clouds and sun were just right to make some cool shots.

The next day we headed out to some plantations. First stop was the Audubon State Historic Site. We were immediately greeted by a tom turkey who took a real fancy to Co. He was in full display mode and was so close I could pet him. He had an entourage of very vocal cats, which I also petted. Alas, we were late for the last tour (I blame it on the turkey and entourage), so we wandered the grounds instead. Below is a pic of the main house.
We decided to head over to the Myrtles plantation to take some pics and walk the grounds. I really didn't need a tour since Co had taken one before and I've watched the ghost hunters episode a few times. We encountered some young girls doing their own ghost hunt at the pond. I even got to see Hester tossing some water (or something out of a pail) out back. Below is a pic of the front of the house.

As Co started the car, all hell broke loose. The interior light started flashing like a strobe light, a bonging noise came on, and a clicking noise was happening behind the radio. This ghost carjacking continued down the driveway but as soon as we were on the road, all was normal. The more logical answer is that the big bump Co had hit in NOLA had begun to jar the permanently shut passenger door so that the "open door" sound and light would sound. No idea about the radio noise. But more about that later.

The potential ghost carjacking wasn't enough to stop us from making a stop at the local graveyard. Dusk was approaching so we scurried around to check out the older graves. We got back into the car and everything seemed normal. But as soon as got on the road, the passenger door, which was stuck in the shut position, suddenly flung wide open. I was riding shotgun at the time so I grabbed the door and we pulled over. I mcgyvered a quick fix with some twine and hung onto the door handle for the 30 minute drive home. Thankfully the twine held the door so that I or car contents weren't tossed out onto the highway at top speed.

For my final day, we took another look at the door. I double tied the passenger door to the car and we headed out to River Road. We aborted any long driving trips thanks to the passenger door situation. We stopped at the Houmas house and got a pricey but worth it tour. Our tour guide was rocking the full petticoat skirt but a fleece jacket on top. That and the only other person on the tour was some sort of idiot. He was one of those people that don't listen and then ask stupid questions. If I had more time and memory, I'd relay the lawn dart death interaction between the tour guide and that guy which almost turned into a "who's on first?"

It goes without saying that the grounds and house were beautiful. The super old live oak was giant and you can barely see me standing at it's base.

Making it Right

I knew one of things I wanted to see when I came down to LA was to see NOLA and the progress of the rebuilding since Hurricane Katrina. We took a quick tour of the Make it Right homes in the Lower Ninth Ward. I had to use my imagination to picture what this neighborhood used to look like. What's left is a scattering of rebuilt homes and brand new Make it Right homes and blocks of fields where homes used to stand. It was amazing to see that the large street trees have survived throughout it all.

The Make it Right homes sure look very cool. I'd love to have one of those homes. I checked out their website and it's definitely worth a peek. What they should do is make the architectural plans or house building available for purchase. The proceeds from that can they go to building more homes in the hurricane ravaged areas. In fact, I'd say that any town in frequent hurricane areas should make some of these hurricane resistent standards mandatory for any new construction.

A peek at spring

I took a break from the uber cold wintry north and headed to Louisiana to visit Cokane. I was initially greeted by a cold rain and a couple crazed barking dogs. That quickly turned to sunshine, warmth, and breakdancing and bouncing dogs. I also got to enjoy a whole bunch of critters that would considered rare in New Jersey. Nevermind that short sleeve t-shirts were broken out in mid-January.

On the first night, a barred owl was spotted in a tree in a backyard in Baton Rouge. This was shocking to me considering I've always known them as a species that hangs out in big swamps or vast forest. But it seems it's not too surprising. I found this interesting article here.

Cokane and I headed out to the Cypress Island Preserve surrounding Lake Martin. We were determined to see some gators and I was just excited to see some bald cypress swamps and any other critters and plants. No gators were spotted. I suppose they are still hibernating. A couple turtles were spotted basking in this ideal day. Red-shouldered hawks were calling like crazy from all around.

On our various driving ventures, more NJ rare wildlife was spotted. An osprey or two always seemed to be hanging out. We passed a bald eagle's nest on the long and painfully straight drive to New Orleans.

Quick visits

We had some quick visits over at the camera trap. Each video is short....like 20 seconds and sound is not needed. It's been bitterly cold and that has taken it's toll on the battery. Cold temperatures really drain batteries. The fox makes its quick appearance in the very beginning. The raccoons have a longer roly poly scampering appearance.

Frozen wasteland

Even though it's winter with subfreezing temps and some snow cover, field work continues. I was in the portion of New Jersey where traffic, tolls, garbage, guard dogs, likely toxic waste, chain link fences with barb wire tops, and unknown hazards abound. So I bundled up and broke out the hand warmers, and off we went. Most of the time was trying to figure out how to get somewhere because of the above hazards, deep uncrossable rivers, and trainlines. We hit an auto terminal obstacle where cars are taken off of trains. We attempted to make contact with the workers to gain access to the area. Apparently it's totally ok to smoke in the outside hallways of buildings there. Lovely! We couldn't get in because the guy we needed was only there in the mornings, but gets to work at 4:30 am if we needed him! Unfortunately, we actually need daylight to do our work.

I tried to tell birdman that this boat was the answer to the deep river crossing problems. But there wasn't a motor, so we passed on that. Nevermind the fact that it just hanging out on land and decrepit.

This frozen lake was a mosaic of shades of light blue and white. Hopefully it's wasn't result of toxic waste.

At one point in the day, we ran into an unexpected surprise. At first glance, I thought I was staring at a black bear stuffed animal. Then I thought it was a dead black cat in circle formation. Then I thought it was a dying black cat in circle formation. It was after subfreezing and not a spot I'd see a cat laying out. I continued to keep my distance but birdman cautiously crept on top of it. It was breathing and we were talking at normal voice...enough for most cats to hear. I thought birdman was going to touch it, but then it finally woke up and ran off in a flash. I guess it was in deep sleep dreaming about mice or something and the typical urban city noise drowned our voices out.