And the Good Rain Just Keeps Falling

I was coming home from running errands the other morning when I was greeted by this sight at Sherwood Way and Loop 306.

Turbine blade in transport

You can click on the image to enlarge it some. That is a large blade from a wind turbine being carted down the highway. When I spotted it, it had been heading east on US 67 and was turning north on our local loop. You can see the reddish truck cab far right. The blade extends well into the intersection, somewhere below the traffic signals. There was another truck behind it pulling an identical load. I probably had to wait about 10 minutes or so for both trucks to inch through the intersection. Wow! Those folks can really drive those trucks. As someone who has towed long trailers, I admire anyone who can maneuver a long rig through tight spots.

We've received more rain. This past Wednesday morning, I recorded more than 1.5 inches at my house, but the local airport reported more than 2.5 inches. The Mertzon area to our west reported more than 5 inches, and Menard to the southeast reported a similar amount. Then a day or two later, we received an additional half inch. We are now about an inch above our average for this time of year.

For most of us out here, that is good news. With the ground saturated from previous rains, much of this water is going into our reservoirs, and that benefits a lot of people in the area. I do worry about our farmers, though. I know they want to get seed in the ground, and heavy rains can either delay this or wash away or rot seed that is already planted.

In my last entry, I shared the chart below, which showed the status of our area lakes at that time.

Lake data for May 5, 2019. Source: Water Data for Texas

Now, here are the levels as of this morning.

Lake levels as of May 12, 2019

For some reason, O.C. Fisher doesn't collect as much water, and I'm not sure why that is. Nasworthy is a constant level lake, and it is downstream of Twin Buttes. I recall reading once that the city tries to keep that lake at about 90% capacity. Water from all the lakes above eventually flow downstream to O. H. Ivie, which is our primary source of water. It also supplies water to other municipalities in the area, such as Midland.

A cool front moved through Friday. Our high that day was 57. With the strong wind, it felt like 45 or so. BRRRR! I thought winter was over. We even turned our furnace back on. It is warming again, though, and we should now be able to turn the furnace off until next fall.

Donna has just about completed her front beds. I'm going to let her plants settle in a bit, then I'll snap some photos and post. It's nice to see some color other than green in those beds.

And to all of you mothers out there, happy Mother's Day!