Hail the English summer!

Tonight, we have removed electrical goods from the floor and put our spanky new Wellington boots upstairs. We may need them in the morning. The ground floor may be under water. For those of you with a keen eye to the international weather reports, you may already be wondering how wet we are. So far, not very. Tomorrow, likely somewhat damp. We are told that a surge of water will be marauding down from the hills tonight while we sleep, pushing the Thames river even farther beyond its banks. As you might imagine, this is rather novel for Flame-Haired Angel: she being from the driest* continent on the planet. So novel, we have moved everything upstairs. Well, most things. Okay, a great many things. Listen, there are now things upstairs that were downstairs not a day ago. It's a full-blown flood panic, dammit. On Friday, the water threatened our sand-bagged front door. This is what it looked like after the sky cleared and the water had started to recede. It had been deeper. Camera wasn't first thing on the mind when frantically piling the sand-bags. Then, a beautiful weekend made way for our housewarming party. Today, the Thames environment agency is telling us to shut off our power overnight, and to get those sandbags back in place. Their flood map shows us under water by morning. Even if only by inches. The neighbors are divided. "Never happen", say the blokey blokes. "Not since '47." Those down on the river edge, however, whose houses are built on little stilts, already have to don their hip-waders to get to their Range Rovers. Perhaps we were naive when we moved into the village of Shiplake. We assumed the name wasn't an exact descriptor. .. *Okay, second driest. But Antarctica's barely even inhabited.