So the day starts out with a wakeup to rain. We get ready, and my mom heads into town to work at her business like she always does in the morning. My older
sis goes with her to pick up her car, which she'd left there when they went to a KS Family Policy Council meeting last night.
I take off to run some errands, and then go to the college where I'm taking classes.
So I get this call, and my mom's business is flooding. Obviously, Valley Center, KS, which I'm convinced from past experience is the most flood-prone city in the state, is under water. No fun. I drive into Wichita proper and find it not that far of from Valley conditions (BTW, the name Valley Center does come from...a Valley. Not the best place to ride out a flood). So...I'm heading to school and rather stupidly get myself into a situation where I'm in a parking lot and all the roads are flooded. I decide to try to go through some of the water and...my car cuts out. THAT'S flooding the engine. So, after sitting in the middle of a deserted intersection (well, almost deserted, there were three or four other stalled out cards around me), I manage to get going again, get to school and receive a progression of calls throughout the morning from my dad.
"If you need to go home and help your mom out, be careful of this route."
30 min later...
"If you need to go into Valley Center, stop by the house an pickup a car with more clearance than yours [my car is a 2000 Taurus]"
30 min later...
"Don't try to get into Valley."
Sweet. Okay. So my 12:00pm class is getting close, and the university shuts down due to weather. Yipee, no class. Since I'm already in town (we're located about 30 miles outside of the downtown Wichita area), my mom asks me to pick something up for her. Remember that area I stalled out at? Yeah, add another hour of rainfall to it. "Sure mom, I'll pick it up."
And on the way there I start hydroplaning. Fun stuff. Well, I manage to NOT run off the road or total another car, and make it there. I then head back to our house, and hear that ALL of the entrances into Valley are blocked off. Well...I didn't have to work tonight, obvious reasons. So, I head straight for our house outside of Valley. On the way, I found out that though I had to turn the wipers on max in Wichita, the North side was getting even more rain, and that while traveling at a minimum of 40 up an interstate (quite a few people going the minimum as well). This is what we call "white-out." And its not even a blizzard.
So, I pull off to our exit, and the neighborhood lake has overflowed between a pair of hills facing the main road outside our house. And...the road is flooded. Pulling into the neighborhood, every gully and ditch is also flooded. And some ditches that I didn't know were ditches before. And backyards. But, our house is pretty high off the ground, so I didn't think we'd have any problems.
Walk inside, head to my room in the basement.
*SPLOSH*
You guessed it. The basement's flooded. At this point, I'm kinda like...
(for lack of the old bang head on brick wall smiley).
So we spend the rest of the day ripping out carpet and trying to dry out the basement as best as possible. I'll have pics on my facebook later.
Finally, we kick back for the night, flip on the news...
"Hurricane Ike is bearing down on the Texas coast..."
Plus we have another storm tonight. So, keep your eye on Wichita, KS! Hopefully we'll be alive by the time next week ends. And pray for us, seriously, we really need it.
Topic: Of stalled cars, hydroplaning, underwater cities and a flooded basement. (Read 899 times)