The Fails of Spring

We all need to feel better about ourselves sometimes, to know that some people are dumber, more klutzy than we are.

So every month, I bring you a compilation of some of the sometimes new, sometimes old ways people find to be exceedingly stupid, to injure themselves, to humiliate themselves.

I bring you  the May, 2011 monthly edition of FAILS.

Progress at the House

Sometimes, when I'm discouraged because of a rain out, or a lack of time, or both, in getting things done, like I am this morning, it's worth it to see that I have made progress. As you can tell by the scene in front of my house in the two pictures in this post, I have more work to do, but I've definitely come along.

The first photo shows the scene last spring, when I was trying to build a wall. Next photo was taken recently, as I started to plant perennials and Jeff made major repairs to the deck. Much better.

Makes me want to go out there and do more work, if it would only stop raining. Next up: More plants, and we paint the house a darker green (note the samples on the wall of the house near the window on the right.

More Damaging Storms in Vermont

This has been quite a year in Vermont weather. We've always gotten extremes, but this year it's one right after another. Flooding has been happening over and over again for more than a month now.

Menacing storm clouds gather over South
Burlington, Vermont Thursday.

This week, repeated thunderstorms have dumped hail as big as baseballs in the town of Duxbury, prompted rare tornado warnings, caused wind damage, and worst of all, caused some of the worst flash flooding the state has seen. The other night, thunderstorms repeatedly followed state Route 2 northeastward from central Vermont to the northeast corner of the state.

Damage was really bad in many towns, including Vermont's capital city of Montpelier, and St. Johnsbury, and especially Barre. In Barre, almost the whole city was covered in mud after the flood. Some streets had two feet of mud on them.  On the trashed Barre-Montpelier Road, piles of mud cleared from the road line either side of the busy route, like ugly brown snowbanks.

Threatening storm clouds over South Burlington,
Vermont on Thursday.

Hundreds of houses and businesses are damaged. The photos in this post are only a glimpse of what happened.

Today, the bad weather was supposed to wane. But they've extended the flash flood watches. Torrential thunderstorms are supposed to blossom again this afternoon, threatening us with anothe rround of wicked weather.

I'm at once fascinated and horrified by all of this. I like the excitement of big storms, but of course I hate even more intensely that people's lives are upended by all of this. Luckily, nobody has died in the latest round of storms. That's miraculous, considering the worst flooding hit at night, when you're out on the road and can't see what's going on until it's too late.

Chaos after flash flooding Friday in Barre, Vermont. 

This storm had the usual array of disaster idiots, too. In flooded downtown Montpelier, a car zoomed around barricades blocking inundated State Street. The car splashed through for about 200 yards, and stalled. Four beefy young guys got out of the car and pushed it away, somewhere. Morons.

A man crosses a mud caked street in Barre, Vermont
Friday. 

A car is barely visible in flooding
in downtown Montpelier, Vermont Friday.

A small crowd of onlookers laughed at them, for good measure.

In Barre, one street was covered in up to two feet of squishy, soft mud. You couldn't even walk through it, much less drive. One guy tried, but got stuck, naturally. Nobody helped push him out, even though he asked. Because he was an idiot.

But people helped everybody else where needed. Clots of people showed up to rescue merchandise from the rising water in store basements in Montpelier. One guy I met hitchhiked for 45 minutes into Barre to help shovel mud, remove ruined furniture from houses, or do whatever needed to be done.

So, we help each other out, and watch the skies for the inevitable next storm. We wait the storm out, clean out the mess and get ready to do it again. It's becoming a routine now.

These guys drove past barricades on flooded State Street
in Montpelier, Vermont Friday. The car stalled, and
they had to push it out of the water. Morons. 

And we count our blessings. It's bad, but not nearly as awful as disasters like that tornado in Joplin, Missouri. Survivor's guilt, I guess.

Spring in my yard: Ugly and Beautiful

It's been a weird spring around my yard and property in St. Albans, Vermont.

Even as I work to improve the landscaping, bad weather keeps getting in the way, or undoing my work.

A flash flood surges through my yard in
St. Albans, Vt. last Friday.

As you can see in the photos, even as flash flood surge through my yard, wrecking things, flowers continue to grace the area. The lilacs, like the one pictured near my front door, are especially fragrant. Ahhh...

The day after the flash flood, these lilacs
serene bloomed in front of my house. 

All the weird weather doesn't matter in the end.  I keep plugging away, and things gradually improve.

The Horrible Sounds of a Tornado

Of all the news and images coming out of Joplin, MO, where a tornado yesterday killed 89 people, the nost stunning video has visuals that are almost nonexistent.

But the sounds pack such an emotional wallop. It's the sound of 20 or so people huddling in a convenience store cooler as the tornado hits. The sounds and the terror are haunting. You don't want to ever be hit by a tornado, that's for sure.

Listen for yourself:

Slo-Mo Landslide Fun

Out in Wyoming, there was this weird landslide that went very, very slowly.

Usually, we think of landslides as masses of dirt and rocks and trees tumbling in a scary fashion down a hill.

In Snake River Canyon, Wyoming, one slide is only moving several feet of day. Wyoming Department of Transportation workers had a little fun doing a time lapse video of the slide, complete with DOT workers enjoying the ride on the slide. Really, really cool. Watch:

The Beautiful, Ugly Flood

For a month at least, Lake Champlain in Vermont has been flooding, wrecking camps, damaging homes and roads, and just causing misery and annoyance.

The water isn't receding fast, so this will go on for awhile.

I took the photo in this post two days ago at Burlington, Vermont's flooded Perkins Pier. It's sad that the park there is under water and wrecked, but I do like the photo. The oddly bright colors, the reflections and the misty background are strangly pretty, even though nobody is happy the flood is continuing.

Click on the pic to make it bigger and get a better look at it, if you'd like