The ark has landed

Well, hey! It hasn't rained in about 12 hours. The lake and lagoons continue to rise, though, as we are downstream from much of the hardest hit areas of Wisconsin. My neighbors down the street have sandbags fortressing their yards and homes, too late, though for some of them. They don't call it a flood plain for nothin'. Even the neighbor next door is down the hill just far enough that the water table has risen into his basement. We had a bit of water, but nothing to complain too much about. Kayleigh, Eric and I worked to direct water and wet-vac the stuff that got in the house. Every time it rains, we're learning what we need to do with our landscaping to keep our house dry. Eric checks the gutters frequently now, and he recently caulked the gap between the house and the driveway. When our neighbor was out with a snow shovel trying to get the water away from his house, Eric tore down a fieldstone garden wall to channel the water to a different part of the back yard and away from our house and the neighbors'.

In the midst of it all, we got our new carpet for the basement. It seemed a bit idiotic to put new carpeting in while we worried about it flooding, but we went ahead. It was the end of April when the old carpet got flooded out, and we haven't had a drop in that part of the house since.

The installers were a couple of brothers doing subcontract work. They were a stitch, singing along at operatic volume to the radio and politely substituting "sugar" for "shit" when something didn't go perfectly. The only trouble we had was that we had asked for the carpet to be glued to the floor and they put pad down. I had seen pad on the invoice, but I assumed it was for the stairs. That'll learn me, huh? They were not pleased, and neither were we. The salesman had written the work order wrong, but we approved it. Eric and Shane, one of the installers, talked to our salesman. They worked out putting down a rubber pad that won't hold water. Shane said he's removed water-damaged carpet with that kind of pad underneath, and the pad was fine. It costs more, though. The salesman ate the cost, and we have a purple rubber pad under our new carpet. We're not convinced it is such a good thing, but we are willing to live with the consequences.

Anyway, I'm glad our corner of the world is drying out.