A town under siege

If ya'll hadn't ever heard of good 'old Palmyra, Indiana before - surely you know it now from the news! Our little town is drowning from the recent torrential rains. And while I knew we were getting a lot of rain & there were lots of places filling with water, I never realized just how bad it was going to become...(& by that I mean how it was going to affect me....)

Tuesday morning the water was over the highway in front of work. I had to drive through this. It was kinda deep, but you could still see the lines of the road. Mom called around noon & said that the water was rushing over the road near their house. So I went over to take pictures! This is the road that leads to the town cemetary. The water had been filling up in the large, very deep field next to this road. It could finally take no more & started to pour over like Niagra Falls. It ran from the road through another girls yard & then behind moms lots behind their house. It was actually running when I was taking pictures. It looked like a creek!

THEN a news van pulled into our parking lot at work. Lora & I were very excited. They sat in the van for-EVER & finally some guy got out. Lora was like, "It's that guy...it's that guy!" I looked & said, "OMG! It's Joe Arnold!" We immediately RAN from our perch at the window to get away from him!
He came inside the store & chatted for a minute & asked if they could park the van there. We.are.big.time. It was also around this time we heard the town had put the kabash on using any sewer. UHM, no flushing, no draining... nothin'.

They left for a bit & then came back. And then...the antenna mast started going up towards the heavens. And it was then we knew... we.were.gonna.be.on.the.freakin'.news.

You must understand. We have no excitement here. We come to work, we suffer for 8 hours & we leave. This was a major shake up in our normal mundane day. They sat in our lot for like 2 hours. The camera man took some shots of people driving through the water. Then Joe went out with that microphone. We couldn't figure out if he was going to interview people driving through or what? Nope, turns out he held the microphone down to get audio of the water going 'swissssssh'. Like I said - BIG.TIME.

As the masses left at 5:00, they were setting up for a live shot. I texted B-rad & said, "DVR THE 5, 5:30 & 6 NEWS! CHANNEL 11 IS IN OUR PARKING LOT!"

So here's the deal. B-rad & I live on the out-skirts of Palmyra. We are also NOT on the towns water nor sewer. We have a well that we get water from & we have a big concrete tank thingie buried in our backyard for our...sewer. Sounds gross, I know...but that's what we have. So we were not affected at home by this travesty. Jeremy came over & took a shower last night because he does live in town. I also noticed on my way home last night that there were port-a-potties strategically placed all over town for residents to use. This is the ONE time living in the country has actually paid off. Score 1 for the McAfee's!

At my place of employment we have about 32 employees. Of those 32, 6 are women. That's it... And none of the people in charge have vaginas. Only wee-wee's. So you can imagine their concern & attention to making sure that those with vaginas have proper facilities to use. I mean, Lora's had 4 babies....we're lucky she can even hold it for a few minutes! So the guys thought they'd be really funny & make us a place to use the potty. Hardy.har.har.

After we held it as long as we could, Lora & I got in my car & drove in to town (which is like a 30 second commute) to use some of the strategically placed port-a-potty. They were still fairly clean, but it's still a port-a-potty. Nas-ty.

Finally one of the people with wee-wee's started calling around to see if we could get a port-a-potty here. Well, uhm-they were all out being used. This is a small town where everyone knows everyone & the wee-wee man was able to get the town to bring us one of their strategically placed pots. And then they strategically placed it here. Toward the back of the property (as far away from the people with vaginas) as they could. In front of the lawn mower shop. Where you have to walk around 40,000 people with wee-wee's to go potty. Sigh. (Also notice they've stacked lawn mowers around it? NO RESPECT!) Since we can't wash our hands (no water down the drain, remember?!) this is becoming some really popular stuff! This is how we wash our hands now. Not the best thing in the world, but it's better than nothing.

Rumor has it that if people do not obey the state of emergency & continue to use their sewer, the town will shut the water off. (Uhm, my dad is like the president of the town board...I KNOW he's just crazy enough to do it. Don't push him...) So I am patiently waiting for the Army to come marching down the road. Ya know like in the movie Outbreak? 'Stay in your homes. Do not turn on your water. Do not flush your toilet or you will be taken out & shot!'

**UPDATE** At the urging of my co-workers, I called dad about an hour ago to find out what was going on. The sewer ban has been lifted, but they are asking us all to continue to conserve water. Oh, happy day! Peeing in water like God meant it to be!!!