I’m still in my office, rather than on my way to Toronto, because Pittsburgh — inland though it is — has had its own close, personal, and somewhat intimate encounter with Hurricane Ivan. To call what has happened here “flooding” is somewhat of an understatement.
17 September 2004, is officially the rainiest day in Pittsburgh’s recorded history, with 5.08 inches falling in a single day.
Small Japanese sedans are floating through the streets. Highways are closed. Basements are flooded. And, most tragic of all, the traditional Friday Night Pizza has not been delivered to my place of employment. While realizing that you can’t go home does tend to focus the mind on fixing the bugs — since there’s nothing else to do — the gnawing hunger tends to distract.
It’s not just raining cats and dogs here; the cats and dogs themselves are actually spitting and drooling as they tumble from the sky. I still have plans to try to get to Toronto tomorrow — the room, alas, has been booked and paid for — but won’t be surprised if the highways are blocked. Somewhere on Yonge street there is a hot dog with my name on it, though. I shall persevere, and find a way.
