Rain... Rain... Rain...

As most of you know, California has been in an increasingly serious drought situation over the last few years, and, while yesterday's deluge did not reverse that trend totally, the rain we had yesterday set records all over the area. I'm not sure how much it rained here in Antioch, but probably 3 or 4 inches based on other areas nearby. Many spots set records for rain in October or rain in a 24-hour period. One area in the Santa Cruz Mountains got over 8 inches, and I heard of one spot (not sure where) that got 20 inches... that's a lot of water anywhere.

Of course, hilly areas that had fires recently or even a year ago are particularly susceptible to mud slides, so there's a lot of preventative work done there. We're in good shape at our place.

We had some "flooding" in the fellowship hall downstairs (sort of a half-basement). The drains and sump pump were clogged and the overflow seeped into the youth room and hallway before one of our members got it cleaned out. As a result, Brice, Kyle and I spent some time with shop vacs, sucking up water, and we have fans running, trying to get the carpet dried out. This has happened numerous times over the last 30 years, so it's nothing new.

Totally unrelated, today is the birthday of Dwight D. "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in Europe in WWII and 34th President of the United States. Most consider him to be an outstanding military commander, and opinions about his presidency run the gamut, usually along party lines. One of his most noble ideas was to grow the Republican Party from one known mostly as a "rich men's club" in those days to something more inclusive. It was known as a "big tent" approach... to more or less compete with the Democrats, "the party of the common man." Not sure how successful he was, but I heard a related quote the other day from my daughter, which paraphrases something like this, "The Big Tent of Eisenhower, has become a one ring circus today." Not sure if those of you reading this will agree with that, but I thought it was a creative quote for Ike's birthday.