Fargo Flood Watch 2009 (part 7)

What a day. You haven't lived until you've sandbagged in a snow shower. Really, I mean that. Ted Cihak and I helped build a sandbag dike along the Rose Coulee about 300 yards from the Microsoft campus. We turned that mother out, if I may say so. Ted is a retired Technical Sergeant with the Air National Guard, so we looked pretty spiffy in our authentic military grade gear. He is also a developer on my team at Microsoft.

After that we headed to Moorhead's sandbag central to fill sand bags. We originally intended to go to north Moorhead to help out there, but every route was choked. We sat on Interstate 94 at a literal standstill for about fifteen minutes before taking a handy exit and trying a different route. When that proved just as useless, we changed our plans.

The new crest forecast is for 42 feet sometime Friday, with the possibility of 43 feet on Saturday. This is a problem as the main dike was just raised to 42 feet. Not to mention all the individual homes who will need to build onto their existing defenses after thinking they were done. There is a lot of work left to do and not a lot of time to do it.

I talked to my manager Gary tonight. He is taking a boat out later to his sister-in-law's house. I was out there on Tuesday and a truck was all we needed. The water is rising fast around here.

Thankfully we are dry at our place, though I refuse to shovel the 6+ inches of snow that fell yesterday. It's supposed to get above freezing this weekend, so let the sun do some work for once. Sorry Mr. Postman.

Donna and our friend Alyssa Short (of Angel in the Kitchen fame) made a Sam's Club run and bought tons of food to donate to some of the local rallying points in the flood fight. How awesome is that?

I am exhausted right now, and I am going back out in the morning. So enough talk. Look at some pictures while I drink a beer:

As always, check out more of my pictures here, and see professional pics here.