a couple things - one awesome, one not.

first, congrats to my friends Katie and Bret!  They are having a...girl!

they will be awesome parents,

and i'm sure they'll raise their little chica to be as big of a cyclone fan as they are.

it's only right -

especially in hawkeye land. 

second, my home town is under water, shut down, and...stranded.

9 inches of rain today alone - maybe more.

i know it's nothing different than what people just a few miles away from here went through, both in Colfax and up in Ames.  this definitely hits home, though, both figuratively and literally.

i know what floods, where it floods, and how it floods in my home town.  it's just hard - really, really hard - to see people who i've known since i was born have their houses flooded. even though it's much farther away, somehow it's a lot more intense for me.  the floods are worse than i've ever seen in my 27 years, and that's saying a lot considering the town has rivers flowing on almost all four sides of it (N-S-E-&-W).

so here's to praying to God that He

1. continues a very healthy pregnancy for Katie and her little bambina,

and

2. delivers my hometown from this flood.  a divine ark wouldn't be such a bad idea, really.