[ transplog ]

Hurricane Alex did not visit us on the Gulf Coast, despite showing an early inclination for our fair city. Instead she gifted Houston with rain and lots of it. In the past two days, I've seen plump drops flicking from the skies and turbo-charged dashes of rain and sideways swirling masses of rain.

And today on the drive home, I spotted a new water feature in the neighborhood streets...

Rain comes down, sewer fills up

The forecast for this weekend offers more of the same. That means slogging again through urban ponds and wrestling with stubbornly inverted umbrellas. (And count Houston lucky if no homes or streets flood.)

And I hope that Alex moves on, soon. Fireworks! We need fireworks.

Drops of rain stud the edges of a pine needle.

A bloom before its due is weighed down by an icy winter rain.

The temperature lingered just above freezing on the day after Christmas. And so the precipitation was a drizzle: icy cold but still liquid.

As it fell, the bright drifts of snow were first compacted and then dulled. And it erased the white-limned lines of winter branches, leaving them slick and clean—but not bearing the warm hues of spring growth.

A single droplet tipped many a branch and leaf. Each droplet reflected as silver in the wan afternoon light: move closer and you find a fun-house portrait, a dull white winter world in the reflection.

Droplets of rain reflect the skeletal lines of trees in winter.