The year started off bright and shiny

but despite perfect pears from Kirk and Brenda

the sun didn’t last past day one

as the rains emphatically returned Monday.

It continued much the same throughout the week

as creatures great and small sought higher grounds

from atmospheric [and other] rivers.

We ourselves were fortunate in being on somewhat higher ground already

as the hits just kept on comin’, with slight respite Friday

although beaucoup de flotsam from whatever upstream marshes may still exist was much

in evidence not to mention what

blew in under the patio furniture

while we were sheltering in place.

Sunday brought the sun back, wrapping up a week also notable for our* self-demeaning Cali

congressional slimeball-sans-balls Kevin McCarthy’s troubled ascension to the Speakership but,

just like the sunshine, that ain’t gonna last.  The ducks, inland in great numbers, know that**

and more and as for the shore, well, underwater at best.  Nevertheless we here are way more

fortunate than many, riding out these storms without [so far] leakages, power outages or floods

and as for the first week of 2023, all’s wet that ends wet.

*Well Oildale’s, anyway.

**Not that ducks give a guano about ‘that’ in the least.