The predawn hours have been accompanied with the distant rumble of nature’s own percussion section. Tropical storm Erin moved ashore just northeast of Corpus Christie this morning and the outlying rain bands began to come ashore here yesterday morning. So far we have managed to dodge the heavier bands of rain that are wandering around the SE coast of Texas, but from the sounds coming in from outside, not by much. I have heard thunder to the north and thunder to the south. At the moment there are bands of rain to both the east and the west and the thunder is coming closer.

The Houston Chronicle announced a bit ago that Erin has now been downgraded back to a tropical depression. Depending on how fast she moves out of the are, that should be a good thing. Slow moving tropical depressions have a way, though, of dropping more rain than this billiard table flat land south of Houston can really handle. When that happens the roads, designed as part of the drainage system, fill rapidly with water playing havoc with the daily commute in this rather overpopulated area of the subtropics.

The silver lining, if one exists, is the moderation of the extreme temperatures from earlier in the week.

 

 

The above photo is this morning’s GOES Eastern US SECTOR Infrared Image. It gives a very good indication of what we have going on weatherwise here. Would that I could, I would send this moisture east over the very dry southeastern US. We have had an uncommonly wet spring and summer so far and I do not feel we need the pattern to carry thru to fall.

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Looks like the muse for today is going to be just the weather. I think I’ll go pull up a comfortable chair, open the curtains to see what is happening, and read a good book…

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Evening Followup: Well rain it did and Houston felt the brunt of it. Flooding was prevalent all over the city. Commuting was disrupted. All of the Interstates and major highways were shut down at some point today. The local news programs were all weather, all the time. I have one complaint with that…They repeat the same thing over and over and over and it’s mostly what they don’t know.

Anyway, we are all at home safely and the rains have tapered off for the evening…