When it's raining really hard, visibility drops, even worse in the past few years since I had the laser surgery done on my eye. On the plus side, my vision in my left eye is nearly perfect and the contacts and glasses I'd worn since early elementary school could be tossed for good. On the down side, my depth perception on that side got worse - much worse when it is dark outside. So in a way, when I drive in the rain, I slide into a type of trance. It's not a calm and relaxing trance, however. No, this is more of an edgy nervous trance where I sit ramrod straight, both hands on the wheels, and fix my attention firmly on the rear lights directly ahead of me. When the rain gets harder, I turn my wipers up as fast as they will go and mutter Unkind Things about the weather under my breath.

It's been a pretty wet season - wet enough that I was confronted with irrefutable proof that it is really winter while driving home tonight. The few of us brave enough to take the back roads were forced to stop and then turn around because the road was not only flooded, but there was a fire truck sitting in our way even if we'd wanted to try to cross the mini lake. Apparently someone tried before us and managed to flip their vehicle.