swinging in the rain

We are getting our storms on the installment plan.

When Patricia came sashaying through our neighborhood, the weathermen predicted she would give us the gift of up to 20 inches of rain.  It did not happen.  We received less rain than we usually get in an average summer storm.

Last night all of that changed.  While eating supper by the beach, an obvious storm front moved in.  By the time I got back to the house to take down an outdoor painting, the rain had started.  Accompanied by one of the best lightning and thunder storms we have had this season.

I knew this was not going to be a normal rain when the street dogs starting lining up in pairs.  And it wasn't.  The rain hitting the laminate at the top of my shower chimney sounded as if Chita Rivera had opened a dance studio up there.

The photograph is what I saw when I opened the garage door this morning.  I am convinced I live on a former stream bed.  Well, I was until I drove down Nueva España -- the main street in my part of town.  It would have done Venice proud.

But not as proud as the streets in San Patricio and Villa Obregón.  Enough rain had formed in the streets to turn the villages into an island.  Well, at least, a peninsula.  One road was handling all of the usual village traffic -- along with the augmented disaster relief traffic that is still in town.

Of course, I have abandoned any hope of my telephone and internet being restored in the near future.  The rain has undoubtedly set back Telmex in its tortoise-speed service.  Lenny Bruce once described Communism as being "one large telephone company."  He was a clever man.

I suspect the reverse is true, as well.  The monopolistic Telmex has all of the efficiency of Bulgarian Communism.

But that is fine with me.  Even though my email inbox is piled high with unread messages, blogs (like the unexamined life) remain strangers, and my magazines and newspapers go unread, I am enjoying my respite from the 21st century. 

I am no Luddite.  But I have been spending more time with people around here -- with some very mixed results.  But that is life.  An analog life without digitization.

Will I enjoy seeing the return of my internet connection?  Of course, I will.  But, for the moment, I am enjoying the change of rhythm -- and the rain, with its own bag of challenges.

My only question is: What is coming next?  A plague of snakes -- or, perhaps, rabid flying monkeys.