Well, only four of us made it in to work today and I made the executive decision to close the office since the town had shut off main water. No water=no toilets and I can't hold it all day.

Driving in to work, I was so focused on making it in that I didn't really look around. On the way home, I stopped in a couple of different towns to see the hurricane's damage. There are parts of the road that are just gone, water is still everywhere. The two historic bridges near us that I had previously been told were gone are still standing but both will need to be torn down because neither has any structural integrity left. There are towns that are still submerged and people are essentially trapped in their homes because the road was washed away, giving them no way to leave.

There is not a single town, or a single person, in Vermont that wasn't affected, even if it was something minor like not being able to stay at work. My family is so incredibly lucky...my parents lost power for a few hours last night and their basement took on a bit of water, and other than that, nothing else happened to any of us. There are about 250 road closures around the state and that obviously doesn't include many small back roads.

The pictures keep coming in from across the state, many of them from my own stomping grounds:
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Avis=BT&Dato=20110828&Kategori=NEWS07&Lopenr=828001&Ref=PH

Also, the VT Standard has some photos, all of them local to my area:
http://www.thevermontstandard.com/

I also found video footage someone took of my old road in SoWo and all I can say is, I am so thankful I don't live there anymore. I would have been trapped. This is insane. You don't even need to watch the whole six minutes, just the first one or two will suffice:
http://www.youtube.com/user/1955fiat#p/a/u/0/D6vqWMqDEVw

I keep looking for pictures of LT, since it was right on the river and I can only imagine the damage it took, but I haven't seen anything yet.

I keep finding more and more terrible videos of the flash flooding. Here's another one:
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-664329

And another (drive past this on my way to work every day):
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-664395

And another picture:
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-664429

I guess at this point, the only thing to be done is to start cleaning up and try to get life back to normal. I just feel so horrible for people who lost their homes and cars and businesses.



Ok, that's it. I'm done looking at CNN. Now on to USA Today.