So on my side of town, we got the most rain on Monday. About three inches here, that all came down between 4:00 and 5:30, and then again between 8:00 and 10:00 p.m. Resulting in about 30 gallons of water in my basement that I sucked up with the shop vac, and sopped up with towels. Still, I feel pretty good because even though 30 gallons is a lot, what it looks like is about 1/2 inch water on half of one room in my basement. Nothing floating or muddy.
Like at Costco, west of us in Middleton, where they got more like 13 inches.
And in Cross Plains, further west, where they got more like 16, and roads buckled and bridges washed out.
And now that it’s 6 days later, and raining, we’re all holding our breath to see what comes next. Even though the West side got more rain in the first place, it’s the East side that’s more flooded and more worried now. There are lots of street closures, a big section of E. Johnson is closed, E. Wash has lane closures, and Livingston St. that’s between Johnson & E. Wash, is a river, running kind of parallel to the real Yahara River, that connects the bigger Lake Mendota and Lake Monona. I don’t fully understand the dynamics of it, but basically the water level in Mendota is going down, while in Monona it’s rising.
Map of closed streets from the City of Madison
Looking towards the Capitol from Blair St. & E. Washington
Some people are sandbagging – these are Dave Watts. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that the basement doesn’t leak. Or worse.
And of course, we still gotta eat. I made plum cake this morning. And scrambled eggs, and fried potatoes with peppers & onions. And cut up some fruit, the “snack” melon from Luck’s Produce at the market was delicious, but I haven’t yet opened up the orange watermelon I got from Tipi in my box on Thursday. I was also running up and down the stairs doing laundry and so on, so it was caramelized onion in the potatoes, and brown butter in the eggs. 
And for the record, since so many people are talking about it, I don’t really think John McCain was an “American hero”, but I certainly don’t think he was awful either. He believed too much in war, but as former military, I think that understandable. He seemed like a principled man to me, and I think our loss is the civility and bipartisanship he exhibited, especially in the age of Trump. I agree with this Guardian article, that says the biggest mistake McCain made was selecting Sarah Palin as his V.P. candidate, thus doing his part to usher in said age of Trump.