Rain and Death

We've been feeling the effects of tropical storm Hanna for about 17 hours now although the heavy rain didn't reach us until about 10:00 this morning. As of 5:00 PM we've received almost 9 inches of rain and it's still raining. Its rained as hard as 2.5 inches of rain per hour, but I think we're now in the tail end of it. That's a heck of a lot of rain. I haven't been watching any of the local news to see how much flooding there has been. Usually Old Town Alexandria is the first to go under water.

Despite the rain, we did have rowing practice this morning. I came home completely drenched and soaking wet. Ann yelled at me for leaving small puddles every where when I got home. The row itself went really well. Our group (the competitive men) took out three 4+s. I've thankfully been moved back to the portside the last two practices. It's just more natural for me. With the rain, but no real wind, we didn't stay out that long. We did manage three 1,500 to 2,000 meter pieces and my boat took all three and by quite a margin. Considering we had two lightweights in our 4+ we did quite well. Our weekday practices came to an end on Thursday a victim of the fading sunlight and the start of high school fall crew. We'll now row Saturdays and Sunday mornings only. Our first Head race is this coming Saturday - the 12.5 mile Wye Island Regatta.

We got the results of the Head of the Charles draw. We got one entry for the Men (Club) and the Women only their guaranteed entry. We also got a double in. Weird. All things considered, I can't see myself making the club entry, but it's not up to me, but our coach.

Ann and I were eating out at Madigan's Waterfront in Occoquan on Friday for lunch when Daughter#2 called with some bad news. One of our neighbors had passed away from lung cancer (he was a nonsmoker). We had known him for over 20 years. They live just down the street from us and his daughter had been a friend of Daughter#2 since they were in kindergarten together. In addition, Daughter#2 had had his wife for a fourth grade teacher. He had been sick for some time and the chemo treatments ultimately couldn't beat the cancer. I wouldn't go so far as to call him a close friend, but he was more then just an acquaintance. The girls played on the same club soccer team for a number of years and we would often talk before, during and after the games. He was extremely proud of his daughter when she was able to make this select team. Washington is a company town. Much like Detroit is a company town with the business being cars, here the business is the Government. Like many of us, Jim worked for the Government. He worked for USDA as a Deputy Director for New Programs. He was a devoted husband and wife and our neighborhood will be the worse for his passing. We attended the viewing on Friday evening and the funeral today. Needless to say the weather mirrored everyone's mood. I didn't envy the family having to bury him in this heavy rain. He's earned his rest.