I have good news and bad news. First, the bad news:

We’ve been monitoring the forecasts and keeping an eye on Debby’s progress all day, and we’ve determined that we’re gonna get a ton of rain. Actually, we’re gonna get several thousand tons of rain. Forecasts call for the midlands to receive as much as 12 inches of rain as Debby wanders by. I wondered what that meant, so I looked it up. Turns out if we put out and empty bucket, and the wind didn’t take it, it would have a foot of water in it when this is over. That’ll wipe out our drought issue. It’ll wipe out a few other things, too.

Here’s the problem- Debby is really wide, she blots out the sun over a huge area, which means that a foot of rain is going to fall everywhere in the midlands. Now a really good summer thunderstorm can drop a couple of inches of rain on us in an hour or so, but it drains off fairly well and after it passes we’re back to steam cooking our eyebrows in the summer sun. That won’t happen this week. We’re going to get three months worth of rain in two days. Imagine the entire midlands covered in a foot of water. It will overwhelm creeks, ponds, drainage ditches and even the rivers. It will have nowhere to go. It’ll run down the streets like its last call at Mardi Gras. It’ll go through a house like it’s Ferris Beuller racing his parents home. It’ll take you and your little Toto, too – no wind required.

What this means for us is potentially catastrophic, life altering water this week. Once it starts rising, it won’t recede until long after the rain stops. If you don’t have to go out, please don’t. The risks we take on any given day when we drive through some water could be deadly this week. It only takes three inches of moving water to carry a small car away. Six inches of moving water can push a bus. I promise you, if the forecast comes true at least one road in our area will be covered by more than six inches of water. Stay away from moving floodwater, either in a vehicle or on foot. It’ll grab you and you’ll have a very hard time getting out. Plus it usually is full of rats, snakes, ant floats and raw sewage. We’ll all know who went in the water.

We’re here to help, and we’ll do our best to save you, but your safest bet is to make decisions that don’t put you at risk this week.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

The good news? It isn’t going to snow.