Kentucky Derby to be held underwater?

Here's the regional forecast from the National Weather Service:

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN LOUISVILLE HAS ISSUED A
* FLASH FLOOD WATCH FOR PORTIONS OF INDIANA AND KENTUCKY...
 
* FROM SATURDAY MORNING THROUGH SUNDAY EVENING.
* A FRONTAL BOUNDARY WILL APPROACH THE AREA FROM THE WEST AND
  STALL OUT ACROSS THE REGION BY EARLY SATURDAY MORNING.
  WIDESPREAD SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS WILL ACCOMPANY THIS FRONT
  FOR MUCH OF SATURDAY MORNING...BUT WILL DECLINE IN COVERAGE BY
  SATURDAY AFTERNOON OR EVENING. THIS FIRST EPISODE COULD PRODUCE
  RAINFALL TOTALS FROM 1 TO 2 INCHES. A SECOND MORE POTENT FRONT
  WILL APPROACH FROM THE WEST SUNDAY MORNING INTO EARLY SUNDAY AFTERNOON WHERE
  EVEN HEAVIER SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS ARE LIKELY. ANOTHER 1 TO
  2 INCHES OF RAINFALL WILL ACCOMPANY THIS SECOND EPISODE...WITH
  WIDESPREAD RAINFALL TOTALS BY THE END OF SUNDAY RANGING FROM 2
  TO 4 INCHES. LOCALLY HIGHER AMOUNTS OF 5 OR MORE INCHES OF
  RAINFALL IS ENTIRELY POSSIBLE.
* SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS AFFECTING THE AREA THIS WEEKEND COULD
  CAUSE HEAVY RAINFALL FOR SEVERAL HOURS...AND TRAIN OVER THE SAME
  AREAS LEADING TO A SIGNIFICANT FLOODING THREAT FOR THE REGION.
  WITH THE EXTREME LIKELIHOOD OF HEAVY THUNDERSTORMS...AND LOCALLY
  HIGH RAINFALL TOTALS OVER 5 INCHES IN PLACES...FLASH FLOODING IS
  VERY LIKELY THROUGHOUT THE WEEKEND.

Totals over five inches? Baglady, I think we're about to get ALL your missing spring rain. In two days.

Farther down the page, they say:

324 PM EDT THU APR 29 2010 /224 PM CDT THU APR 29 2010/
...AN ACTIVE WEATHER PERIOD
[I love that phrase "active weather period"]


IS EXPECTED EARLY SATURDAY MORNING
THROUGH SUNDAY NIGHT WITH HEAVY RAINS...STRONG TO SEVERE 
THUNDERSTORMS...AND FLOODING LIKELY...
STRONG SOUTHERLY FLOW WILL SETUP FRIDAY...ALLOWING FOR A LARGE
AMOUNT OF WARM AND MOIST AIR TO FILTER INTO OUR REGION FROM THE
GULF OF MEXICO. THIS MOISTURE ALONG WITH AN APPROACHING FRONTAL
BOUNDARY AND MULTIPLE UPPER LEVEL DISTURBANCES WILL RESULT IN
SEVERAL ROUNDS OF SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS ACROSS THE OHIO VALLEY
THIS WEEKEND.
THE FIRST EPISODE WILL TAKE PLACE SATURDAY MORNING AS A COLD FRONT 
APPROACHES FROM THE WEST AND STALLS OUT ACROSS THE AREA. A LARGE 
AREA OF SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS CAN BE EXPECTED...WITH A FEW 
STRONG STORMS BEING POSSIBLE. THE MAIN THREAT WITH THESE STORMS 
WOULD BE STRONG WINDS AND SMALL HAIL. HOWEVER...THE BIGGER THREAT 
WITH THIS FIRST EPISODE WILL BE HEAVY RAINFALL WITH 1 TO 2 INCHES 
LIKELY. WITH THE FRONT STALLED OUT ACROSS THE REGION ON 
SATURDAY...SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS WILL BE POSSIBLE DURING THE 
AFTERNOON HOURS AS WELL...BUT THESE STORMS ARE NOT EXPECTED TO BE 
STRONG. 
A SECOND MORE WIDESPREAD ROUND OF SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS IS 
EXPECTED SUNDAY MORNING THROUGH EARLY SUNDAY AFTERNOON AS STRONG LOW 
PRESSURE MOVES ACROSS THE AREA. STRONG TO SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS ARE 
EXPECTED DURING THIS TIME FRAME. THE MAIN SEVERE THREATS WILL BE 
DAMAGING WINDS...LARGE HAIL...AND ISOLATED TORNADOES. THOUGH 
AGAIN...THE BIGGER THREAT WILL BE HEAVY RAINFALL WITH ANOTHER 1 TO 2 
INCHES OF RAINFALL BEING POSSIBLE WITH THIS ACTIVITY.
TOTAL RAINFALL AMOUNTS OF 2 TO 4 INCHES ARE LIKELY THIS
WEEKEND...WITH SOME AREAS PERHAPS SEEING AS MUCH AS 5 INCHES OR
MORE. THIS MUCH RAINFALL IN A SHORT AMOUNT OF TIME WILL LIKELY
RESULT IN FLOODING PROBLEMS...

"likely result in flooding problems"-- ya think???

So if you're going to bet on the Derby, the forecast says to pick a mudder. 

(Or possibly a horse who's been doing equine water therapy...)

[edited to say I tried to fix the formatting, and it looked fine in preview, but now it looks like this again. Drat.]

a good year for corn

Here is a (bad phone camera) picture of what is torturing me at present.

This is where I park at work. There is a whole row of honey locust along the edge of the parking.

The saying around here is that if the locust bloom is heavy there'll be a good corn crop, and it seems to be true. Whatever conditions produce lots of flowers on the locusts in April (or sometimes May) will also be good for the corn all summer. When I've noticed (and since I got allergic to locust pollen I've noticed often) there has indeed been a correlation.

redbud and dogwood

The redbud is almost over, and the dogwood at its peak.

Here is the redbud more than two weeks ago, in bud:

Here's the dogwood two weeks ago, with some redbud in the background:

Now a little less than a week ago (I'm late getting this done!):

The redbud at its best:

Fully appreciated by insects:

Now that the locusts are blooming I'll be too busy staying out of the pollen to take pictures outside, but at least I can look out the windows.

UPDATE: why did my title disappear when it posted? The ways of blogger are strange.

Sunday morning coffee looking down hill

There was no frost Sunday morning, but the thermometer showed only a few degrees above freezing, so I started the morning with a fire. However, before I finished my second pot of coffee it warmed up a lot, so I went out on the deck to drink it. The view from there is a bit different from my balcony, my favorite outdoor morning spot, and I saw things I'd never noticed before.

Here you see a dogwood which is hidden when you're on the ground on this side of the house. I don't spend much time on this deck, and when I do, I'm hanging out laundry on my 16 feet above the ground pulley system, so I'm not paying attention to the woods.

More dogwood showing through the other trees, and down on the left side a touch of redbud.

And there are more hints of pink behind the bigger, taller trees.

I knew that hickory trees must have flowers to produce nuts, but never before have I been in a position to look down on the flowers.

On the forest floor--paradoxically higher up the hill than the tops of those dogwoods and redbuds--there's plenty of woodland phlox.

Then I went back indoors away from pollen.

broccoli

It rained last night. Only two-tenths of an inch, but it was enough to soften the ground up somewhat, so that it was almost easy to dig, and to wash the pollen out of the air, so that I almost felt like digging. So the broccoli plants I bought more than a week ago are finally in the ground.

Such tiny plants at this point. Here's an oak leaf beside one.

Now we get to find out whether I planted them close enough to the house to keep the deer away. I haven't seen tracks that close, but there hasn't been anything growing in that spot that wasn't also growing farther from the house. Will broccoli tempt them closer?

I bought nine plants, that being the smallest pack available. There's only one of me. I like broccoli a lot, but can I eat that much? I hope I can find a gasket for my forty-year-old freezer soon.

springing up

I sighed with relief this afternoon when I came home to find the lilies of the valley had made their way up from below. They were so late I was worried that they might not have survived the winter after I moved them here last summer.  But here they are. There was nothing showing this morning at dawn, so they must have worked hard all day.

The hostas had poked their noses up a few days ago, before I really began to fear that something was killing all the plants in that corner.

They were kind enough to stand in the light for me.

Now I have to hope that turkeys don't like hosta as much as deer do. The deer don't ever leave foot prints this close to the house, but the snow showed that the turkeys come right up within a couple of feet of the walls.

a tail

He says it all with the tail, doesn't he?

proof of spring

In the fall, the sun moves to low to make this pattern through the front door. Now the light is back.

It still isn't high enough to show up for long, or to change shape much, though.

doubles

I don't know how I missed these last year. In the patch of daffodils near the old house foundations is a smaller patch of double daffodils.

I love the way it's hard to tell how far they've opened because they're stuffed so full of yellowness. Yet they have more green than the plain yellow trumpets.

Spring: color!