Needless to say, this has been a stressful as hell kind of week. Hurricane Harvey absolutely relocated a large part of the Gulf of Mexico onto Houston. Having grown up in Houston, I’ve been through my share of storms. In fact, I’ve been through way the hell to many hurricanes and tropical storms and I’m pretty darn tired of it.
I’m really looking forward to leaving Houston. I truly miss San Antonio, the weather, the hills, the food, and the people. So, here are some reflections of what transpired this week.
What seemed 30 days into the hurricane (but was actually only two days) I was mightily bored. So, I decide to break down and do some work on my bikes. Actually, it’s more like organizing my garage and working on the bikes since I’ve never unpacked since coming to Pasadena.
While the rain was pretty heavy, it was nothing that was that horrible. So, I opened the garage door and got to work. I’ve got 2 main bikes which I’ll be writing more about at a later date.
On the right is my Republic Bikes Aristotle Dutch City Bike. It’s a massively heavy tank of a bike but it is an easy riding and smooth land barge. It is the definition of a grocery getter.
On the left if my first proper road bike. It’s a Lapierre Audacio 400. It’s a little bit older of a model but it’s still an incredibly light and heavy duty road bike that will support my Clydesdale frame on the BPMS150 this year.
So what did I work on? Well, I added some very tiny but bright lights on both bikes as well as laser projecting rear lamps for the rear as well as made sure the chains were clean and tight, air in the tires, and some other minor maintenance.
The rain started in earnest Saturday evening. Neighbors had parties to watch the McGregor Mayweather fight. As you can see, the cars were well under water. So not only did you have to pay $100 to watch a fight, you also get to eat that $500-$1000 deductible.
If you aren’t from a place like the Gulf of Mexico region, this probably looks really really bad. To be sure, it is bad but it’s not as bad as it got. The water got a good 20 ft further up the yard from where you see it. It got much higher in fact.
So, why the hell would anyone want to live in Houston with this sort of crap happening semi-regularly? That is a good question. The only reason I returned to Houston was to take care of family that was ill. Otherwise, I’m really looking forward to returning to the Texas Hill Country.
Oh, and if you are wondering, the water got above my knees when I went into the street.
Yesterday was really bad but the rain relented (albeit temporary) enough to clear the roads. Well, to be perfectly honest, they somewhat cleared a few of the roads. Where I am standing in the picture from my front yard, I was up to mid-calf in water. Now, I’m all dry. That’s a good thing.
The only really disconcerting thing is the continuing rainfall. As you can see, the sewers are literally busting at the seams and if the rains continue being heavy, then it will easily burst the edges of of the bayou and flow back into my neighborhood.
This would be no bueno. But, I’m dry or at least dry-ish as it were. We’re so much better off than most, so we’re happy.
EDIT & UPDATE:
When the storm started, my boss told everyone to just go home and work remotely for Monday at the least. Got a call Sunday night saying to just not worry about coming in this week and to work remotely.
Today, I get an email that our office was on the news. If you look just to the right of the picture you’d see the entrance to my office. Or at least what used to be my office. Sigh.
