We interrupt this post series to bring you an important weather update

Those of you who watched my debate will know that I was in Hawaii at the time.  Well, I'm still here.  I have no idea if this is making news on the mainland, but Hawaii has just gone through [two days of one of the most intense Kona storms in many years](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fi7rqxjCuOw).  I have never in my life seen rain this hard go on for so long.  The condo that we are in was not designed for this.  There is a large sliding glass door which is wonderful in sunny weather, but the wind-driven rain was hitting it like a fire hose and driving water underneath the door and into the condo.  And it did this for hours and hours and hours, nor continuously, but in wave after wave after wave of pouring rain.  At one point I went outside to try to lay down some towels on the outside of the door and I got completely soaking wet in a matter of seconds.  We did our best to hold back the ride (literally!) with all the towels that we had but it wasn't enough and we ended up with about an inch of water inside.  Fortunately, the cavalry eventually arrived in the form of the condo staff with big plastic bags full of clean towels and they got everything cleaned up.  I eventually figured out how to use one of the plastic floor runners as a makeshift dike outside the sliding door to keep the water from coming in, and since then we haven't had water on the floor, though there is water coming in on some of the walls and making the paint blister.  The main road through the nearby town of Kihei has been washed out, as has much of the nearby beach.  100,000 people are without power across the state (happily our power has stayed on).  It's a horrible mess, though the locals seem to be dealing with it courageously.

If you've been wondering why I haven't been blogging these past few days, that's why.  Trying to stop water from infiltrating your shelter gets a wee bit stressful after doing it more or less non stop for two days.  Things seem to be finally quieting down now, and the forecast is for the storm to finally pass overnight so maybe tomorrow I'll get something done.