h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

They're financially responsible for any flood damage caused by water flowing from their property. Well, they would be if the law and what is right applied anymore. Since developers tend to have deep pockets and expensive lawyers and the Texas Legislature recently "reformed" tort law, now whoever has the most money wins typically and whoever loses pays for the lawyer fees for the winner.

Also known as the "Don't sue big corporations act."

OH, and speaking of rain and hail, I sent my father a link to a group that records rain, snow and hail amounts from backyard meteorologists. My dad has been keeping his own rainfall records for several years. In the article I read, they mentioned that they required users to purchase one of their $25 rain gauges.

He read up on the site this afternoon. I was not surprised to find out that his existing rain gauge is accepted. It's got a 4 inch opening and outer cylinder that catches overflow from the one inch interior tube that measures in hundredths of an inch. It can measure up to 1 foot of rain without emptying it.

Dad also found out how they record hail amounts. They use Styrofoam sheets. North is marked for orientation. You just leave it out exposed and after a hail storm, you just send it back to them for analysis.

http://www.cocorahs.org/

I had a feeling that was going to be CoCoRaHS before I got to the link They're often talking about it on the YNN website.

As for the flooding problem, I think the complex manager is going to have a little extra workload in the coming months dealing with the owners of the building site, especially with us getting into rainy season. As long as the power doesn't go out I should be pretty immune - one floor up and no car to wash away

The recording station at Camp Mabry has been busted since 5pm yesterday, but during this evening's adventures the airport got 0.86" between 5pm and 6pm, and 1.44" between 6pm and 7pm for a very impressive total of 2.3" in two hours. And there's another big line of storms over the Edwards Plateau moving eastwards which look like they're going to get here soon after midnight.

Oh, and Houston is about to get hammered by the storms that belted Austin a few hours ago

Hmm, water pressure's noticeably down.

The second round of storms came through about half past midnight but they were moving much more quickly than the first lot and weren't as intense - they dropped around a third of an inch an hour for three hours. We did set a new record for the day though:

957
SXUS74 KEWX 030707
RERAUS

RECORD EVENT REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE AUSTIN/SAN ANTONIO, TX
148 AM CDT WED APR 03 2013

...RECORD DAILY MAXIMUM RAINFALL SET AT AUSTIN BERGSTROM...

A RECORD RAINFALL OF 2.57 INCHES WAS SET AT AUSTIN BERGSTROM
YESTERDAY. THIS BREAKS THE OLD RECORD OF 0.61 SET IN 2000.

But there's no global, er, wetting.

There's been one other benefit of the rain. Part of that area at the back of my apartment used to be quiet and peaceful and no-one ever went there, until they turned it into a dog park Now there are people coming and going all day long from before 7am until after midnight sometimes, with dogs barking, dogs fighting, and all the other stuff that dogs do which I don't want to watch them doing when I'm sitting on my balcony sipping a beer and reading War and Peace. But now it's completely waterlogged and muddy, and no dogs

The building site is nice and quiet too

He we go again. The skies begin to tremble, nature collapses into the streaming void. In fifteen seconds' time, the universe itself will be at an end. See where the light of infinity bursts in upon us.

Wait, no. That's something else. What I meant to say is that the sky is darkening again and there's more red and green stuff on the radar, heading this way.

What a grim day. Started out with a temperature of 72°F at 7am, then a cold front passed through and an hour later at 8am it was down to 50° and raining, and 45° three hours after that. Damn glad I'm indoors and baking bread

The forecasters are suggesting we might break an 89-year-old record today - 94°F/34.4°C. I really hope not, but it's likely to come pretty close. We didn't go below 70/21 last night and I can hear plenty of a/c units going already.

We started off at 73°F/23C this morning, but we probably won't get above the 80's this afternoon.

I could really smell those Mexican fires yesterday and the smoke did some very uncomfortable things to my eyes. I'll be very glad when that cold front comes through tomorrow and changes the winds from south to north, and the smoke's not the only reason. I'm not wild about these August-like overnight temperatures and June-like daytimes. At 8am it's 73°F/22.8°C.

That reminds me. I should turn off the pilot light and close the valve to my heater.

Strong smell of smoke this morning too, and a scratchy throat. It's almost 900 miles from the centre of the Yucatan to Austin.

Dammit, all I can smell right now, and have the entire day, is smoke.

It raineth And it are coldeth too It was 74F at 7am, now it's 56F at 9am. Deep joy. And no more smell of smoke.

I was smart this morning and drove the car and brought a fleece sweater and hat.

I love it when it's muggy and then a cold front comes through and you can feel the cooler breeze wafting through the apartment

Yeah, yeah, I know; yesterday was Muggy, today's Choogy, tomorrow's Weggy <nahnah)

A very impressive thunderstorm gave us a little over an inch of rain yesterday evening, and most of that came in about 20 - 30 minutes between 7pm and 8pm. Plenty of thunder and lightning. And a clear, fresh morning today

According to my dad's CoCoRaHS.org report, we had 1.51 inches Friday and 0.02 inches yesterday.

Nice

The storm drain area down by the dumpsters flooded again on Friday, and the rainfall was hardly unusual for a Texas thunderstorm. At least one of my neighbours' cars was inundated. I think someone from the office is going to have to have a very stern talk to the people who own the building site and get them to do something about their own storm drain. At the moment *all* the water from the site comes out of a drain and onto the ground no more than 20 feet from one of the buildings in our complex. I can't imagine how much worse it'll be once the development is paved