Daddy Days: Stormy bathroom weather
Spring is the time of year for flash floods in Central Texas. With the Hill Country topography and the possibility of suddenly full creeks rushing downhill in torrential rains, it’s a legitimate concern in these parts.
Often, before a rainstorm, the National Weather Service will send out a flash flood notice. As radar and technology have increased, the ability to predict and/or warn about severe weather, tornadoes and flash floods also have increased. But this doesn’t impact the flash flooding we’re dealing with closer to home.
We need a flash flood warning in the boys' bathroom. Actually, given the state of that bathroom after the four older boys shower, we need a tornado, high tide, rogue wave and flash flood warning. With maybe a high-bacteria count alert as well.
I have no idea what goes on in there. Somehow one of the boys always comes out looking like the last survivor of a shipwreck.
The 4-year-old came out of the bathroom crying and dripping wet seconds after going to wash his hands. He said the sink “sprayed him.” I asked him if the “sink” was his 6-year-old brother. However, he was the only one in there when this occurred. Upon further inspection, the sink had not only sprayed him head to foot, but it had sprayed the wall, from ceiling to baseboard.
I guess we should have called in a storm chaser team, because I was entirely unable to come up with an explanation for how this happened. The faucet turned on and off just fine for me; there was nothing stuck in, on or around it. Other than a toothbrush found deep in the sink drain, I could find nothing out of the ordinary. We’ll chalk this one up to unexplained natural phenomena.
If the older boys need flash flood warnings for their bathroom, the younger two boys need a tsunami warning next to their bathtub. My wife bathes them in our bathroom because we have one of those deep garden tubs and she thought that would help contain the water. I suppose it does help, but if conditions are right a tsunami can crash over the side in a matter of seconds.
What sort of conditions you ask? Well, step one is for Mom not to be the one giving the boys a bath. Mom seems to have some sort of tsunami early detection or deterrent system. But often one or both of the older boys are giving the littles a bath, and that’s when the storms brew.
How these waves crash over the 2-foot-high walls of the tub, or across the 8 feet of the bathroom floor, or over the heads of the older brothers, is unknown. At least, when asked how this happened, all involved act like tsunami survivors. “I don’t know. It all happened so fast.”
I guess there’s a common denominator to all of these unexplained bathroom water events: the boys. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will give a prediction for the level of activity it expects prior to the Atlantic Hurricane season.
If I had to do the same, I’d predict a very active and above-normal storm season in our bathroom. Also, I’ve got some recommendations for named storms this year.
Harris and his wife live in Pflugerville with their six sons. Please email comments or suggestions for future columns to thoughtsforcaleb@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Daddy Days: Stormy bathroom weather
