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[RedKing]

Cormac McCarthy's "The Road": Now an award-winning reality TV series!

EDIT: Yeah, this looks bad. Slated to be a Category 3 by landfall, then stall out 50-100 miles inland. We could be looking at a big swath of southeast Texas getting 1.5-3 feet of rain.

On the upside, the border wall would be much shorter if Texas becomes part of the Gulf of Mexico.

[alway]

Here I thought California was going to be the first state to be abandoned to the elements after all that drought (the culmination of a fierce rivalry with Florida). But Texas can't let their liberal arch-nemesis outdo them at anything.

This is probably not going to make navigating the many legislative cliffs in september any easier. Going to be difficult to hammer out a deal to fund the budget when a state is underwater (and not the Detroit type of underwater).

I have a friend who lives in Austin.  According to her, what's happened is that a bunch of people from California have moved into Austin.  Since California is an economic oddity that makes money magically appear and disappear, all those people have money.  Meanwhile in Texas you can get a comfortable apartment for 300$ a month, right now.  Of course its probably not near any jobs... anyway.  All the Californians have free time and money so they've been able to seize control of the city council and start leading local politics in a direction that doesn't match what the locals want.  So perhaps Texas is going to have its own little patch of California soon enough.

Not to mention a stress test for Trump's idea of "Lets not fill in official positions for lots of things." Not sure what the status is on nominees and nominations for natural disaster emergency related positions though.

I was worried when this time would come.  I sincerely hope we don't get another Katrina.  Said friend from Texas once gave their own view on what happened.  Apparently Texas interstates are 2 lanes, with high speed limits and no amenities besides gas stations and rest stops that might be 30-50 miles apart.  So when the evacuation of New Orleans happens, they use one of these interstates out to Texas as a main evacuation route.  So now you have a good chunk of a major city going down a two lane road not meant for intense traffic, with stretches of uninhabited desert for wayyyy beyond practical walking distance before you get anywhere.  Long story short the inevitable happens, traffic gets blocked up and then stopped because two fucking lanes, and many people end up living out of their cars for days.  With no real government assistance.

Also in Austin here; they aren't from California, they're just here for the tech industry. 800 sq ft apartment for $900 a month within walking distance of several game dev studios like Panic Button, Zenimax, Arkane, a couple miles from Google, and a bunch of other tech companies in the area? Heck of a good deal. As for the city itself: to the south is downtown & universityland with lots of live music and booze; east/west is generally the historic segregation divide, with east being poorer and west being richer and whiter; northwest around the lake is awful rich people land, and to the far north is commuter mcmansion hell for all the people with a traffic fetish. As for city politics, I'm not aware of it being bad aside from being horribly obstructed by nimbyism and an inertia towards fixing nothing due to the northwest suburbs. As such, traffic is some of the worst in the US. Recently, their grand new design for solving the traffic problems in a city whose population is set to rise dramatically: Adding 1 toll lane in the middle of one of the highways. But aside from traffic, it's mostly just republicans outside the actual city that hate it.

Really though, last time there was 12 inches of rain in a day, there was some pretty bad flooding in low-lying areas and a bit downtown, but a good deal less apocalyptic and more just a problem for people near rivers. People like me who basically live on a mesa, there's really not much to worry about aside from wind damage. The west especially is quite hilly, so it's not like the entire place can just up and flood.

Hopefully it doesn't knock out power for too long though; the hurricane will keep temperatures down in the 80s, but within a few days afterwards, it will be back up to 100F, which is pretty uninhabitable without AC.

[Max™]

I mean, Texas has always had a rather huge local variance, up in the northeast around Dallas, spreading down along I-35, it's so liberal that I was shocked to learn just how freakishly backwards the rest of the state was.

As for how much it will affect the rest of the state, I grew up around Dallas, lived there for the first half of my life, and was never less than 300 miles from the coast. I've been to the Pacific and Atlantic, but never seen the Gulf of Mexico.

[MrRoboto75]

IIRC I've been to florida on the gulf side.  It's dreadful, quite like swimming in bath water.

[Max™]

Old used bath water at a roman communal bath after it was sacked by horny barbarians and used for an orgy.

[Sheb]

Barbarians with a weird gator fetish.

[Trekkin]

Barbarians with a weird gator fetish.

And a firm conviction that they'll be dead or back up north by the time everything they're dumping into the water becomes a problem.

[Frumple]

Oi. The water's not actually that bad over here, in most places. Or at least wasn't the last time I went swimming in some of 'em. I'd probably avoid the major beaches out of principle, but, y'know, this is a goddamn swamp. State's lousy with water. If y'don't like the beaches (also, probably avoid them during fall or winter -- the water's much nicer, then, but you can also get jellyfish swarms coming in with the tide*), we got springs, flooded caverns, some rivers that won't curse your children's genetic code should you dare to swim in them, etc. One of the few things that approach an upside to this damed state.

... the springs can be ridiculously nice in the summer, by the by. So long as it's not (too) snake and/or gator infested. Probably the coldest things here that aren't underground or air conditioned. Only trouble mostly being that you eventually have to get out, and they're usually still fairly exposed to the sunlight, heh.

*E: Or could a handful of years back. Now that I think of it, the spill might have done something on that front. It's been longer than that since I did any beach swimming, heh.

... mostly because I stopped going to the beach very often after getting to see one of those swarms come in. Nice set of goggles, pop your head under the water, literally every direction you see, as far as you can see, inundated with jellyfish. It's not pleasant. Didn't get stung, but folks near me did.

[Starver]

but, y'know, this is a goddamn swamp.

If only there was a business/politician with the power and inclination to drain that for you...   

[Frumple]

Sheeit mang, draining doesn't really help a lot of these places. Water just comes back, 'cause they're coming from up north or underground. You gotta' fill 'em, and then hope some time in the future your junk doesn't fall over and sink, possibly after catching fire.

Suppose it's conceptually possible, but you wouldn't have to drain the swamp, you'd have to empty the aquifer, burn out the caverns, and turn much of the area between here and the Appalachians into dessicated deadlands. Then probably knock most of said range mountain down, to keep things from rolling back down it. Possibly empty the atlantic and/or solve global warming to keep the storms from trying to ramp up.

[scriver]

... the springs can be ridiculously nice in the summer,

language lulz

[MaximumZero]

If it's what you say I love it especially later in the summer.

[Frumple]

Eh, either/or. Or both, I guess. Was talkin' water, though. Not people related other than us swimming in them and screwing with the local environment to wreck 'em to various degrees.

[Starver]

Suppose it's conceptually possible, but you wouldn't have to drain the swamp, you'd have to empty the aquifer, burn out the caverns, and turn much of the area between here and the Appalachians into dessicated deadlands. Then probably knock most of said range mountain down, to keep things from rolling back down it. Possibly empty the atlantic and/or solve global warming to keep the storms from trying to ramp up.

So, a business(man!)/politician who can ask for help from his Best Korean counterpart, then?

(Mutual help, given how Florida lies just outside of the other's current delivery area, obviously...)

[Starver]

In older news (that is at least news)...

The White House noted the call was an Obama administration practice.
"The Trump Administration looks forward to creating its own traditions to observe the High Holidays and other important days in the Jewish faith," an unnamed White House official said in a statement to the BBC.

("We don't care. It was an Obama thing anyway... Good riddance.")