Home again and the area after the flooding

What an epic day of travels. I don't think I'll do that for a few years, vacations and new countries are nice but it's hell on earth coming home with 12+ hours cramped in a plane. We even canceled our trip to Italy next year, I think we are staying closer to home.

This morning I was up with the sun, had to check everything out in the daylight. Since the gutters can only hold so much water as is flows off the steep roof, it has to go somewhere. The water on the backside of the house went under the roofing material and into the wood. We have to do some work in 2 places that the wood is soaked, one is going to be a fairly large projects. This large area caused water to run into the new kitchen corner, ruining the paint. Monsoon rain for hours on end just overwhelmed the drainage capacities of the gutters and drainage system.
We might actually have an estimate done and let insurance deal with it, estimates are free anyhow.

Everything else seemed to be ok at home, the humidity was up in the basement but it's already back down thanks to the dehumidifier (we get 2-3 gallons per day out of the air). The house sitters did a good job, but somehow managed to miss 7 piles of dog crap in the upstairs rooms. I knew it as soon as I walked in, how can someone stay in a house with the smell and not figure it out? We assume they were rushed in the morning when the teenage daughter had to go to school, so they didn't get let out for long enough periods of time. Easy solution, they won't be house sitting anymore, I'm not going to have our dogs go through that.

By 9AM the house was back in order and the sun shined. We toured the damage around the area and it's obviously been overplayed. Sure, some people got hammered and flooded, but we were expecting disaster like they are having up in the north end of the state. I'm heading out for a run in a while and will take some trails around the police cars that are keeping roads closed. It will be interesting to see the river higher up in the mountain, I'll take my phone so I can get some pictures.

With the media and it's nonstop coverage including mandatory evacuation zones and maps, we had looters. One of our new MAG group members lives next door to my Mormon friend, so now we have 2 group members 1/4 mile away. They patrolled at night and ran 2 guys off who were checking around and peeking over fences. They also got harassed by a few police officers for walking around with weapons (perfectly legal), but if I was here I would have been right there with them. This is our neighborhood, our homes and our stuff, we won't let people take it so easy and the supervisor who was called on scene understood and accepted that.

Speaking of media, every paper at the JFK airport in New York has assault weapons n the front cover and were calling for a ban. "Same Weapon, New Slay" was the headline on one, including a picture of an AR-15... I bet they won't (or the idiots on the TV) say they were wrong, they will just skip over the fact one was never used.

First order of business was Starbucks. I pointed to the employee memo that was  highlighted "ALL EMPLOYEES MUST READ", detailing the request for Starbucks customers to not bring weapons into the stores or sitting areas. I laughed and told the employees I read that policy online this morning, and then we ordered some drinks. My XDM was open carry, large and in charge, they can politely request until they pass out.

Pictures up this weekend from the trip once I get them sorted out.