All wet

When we were first viewing this place, I naturally asked if they'd ever had water in the lower level. I was told, "Never". "This is Chicago," I retorted, "all basements get water in them sooner or later." So the agent clarified that it had never happened in the seven years his clients had owned. Who knows, he may actually have been telling the truth. (That's anyone's guess, of course, given that he lied to me outright about other aspects of the place.) All I know is that after less than a year of ownership, we've had water three times from three entirely different sources.

First there was the front room saga. No need to go through that again; lowering the grade (or "the grate", as one of my neighbours would've written) a couple inches in front seems to have kept water from seeping into the gap between brick and foundation. Then during the winter, we had that Zhivago-esque ice column out back which when it melted sent dirty water running over the threshold to pool outside the bathroom. Today, I was trying to sleep when I heard a loud "glug glug" sound coming from...somewhere. Fearing the worst, I went to the toilet and saw the water level slowly rising. Then I remembered the standpipe in the laundry room (installed as a "precaution" according to Mr Lying Agent) and went to inspect it. Sure enough, there was a tiny puddle forming at its base.

So I pulled clear anything that could be ruined (such as the furnace filters) and went upstairs to tell monshu to keep an eye so I could relax enough to catch a few more winks. Fortunately, that seems to be the end of it. I don't think it coincidence that this occurred about the same time that the backed up sewers had completely flooded the street outside. (Except--I noted with some satisfaction--on our corner where monshu and I have both previously de-mucked the grate.) Once the downpour stopped, the huge puddles disappeared, which suggests to me it wasn't so much a matter of the drains being clogged as much as the sheer amount of flow temporarily overwhelming them. No more monsoons, no more backup. Please?

*****

On a more charming note, Kitty has never been one to flee from storms in the past--at least, not that I've noticed. He was sleeping quietly on our bed this morning until we lost power momentarily, causing the lights to blink out and the fan blower to cease and start up again. That prompted him to perk up and rush out of the room.

When I came upstairs later to tell the Old Man about the water, he said to me, "The cat was really spooked by the hail. He was running around and then he went into the pantry and curled up." I peeked in myself and, sure enough, there he was sitting in the dark. He didn't look shaky and the hail was over, so I scooped him into the arms and brought him over to the window.

He got increasingly tense and curious as we got closer, straining at the neck to take in what was happening. Still I thought he'd be all right, but then came a huge flash and peal of thunder, and he broke free in order to take shelter again in the only upstairs room without any windows.

*****

Speaking of hail, the garden seems to have come through okay. The larger leaves of the sorrel and borage are pretty battered and probably not usable for anything besides compost, but everything is still standing. The mint is pretty well flattened, probably due to runoff from the decks above, but if I know mint, this will be a boon to it; the stems pressed to the ground will sprout from all over during the next couple days of warmth and sun and soon I'll have the critical mass of herbage I've been looking for to make a big pot of minty iced tea.