Margaritaville and the Great Nashville Flood of 2010

This past weekend, Kitten came to town for the Jimmy Buffet concert. It started raining on Saturday afternoon, but that didn't put a damper on our enthusiasm. We stopped off at Urban Flats for a glass of wine and a snack and then went to the concert. Before the show started, Nashville's mayor and police chief came on stage and told people to stay downtown after the show, the rain was starting to make travel difficult to the south. I don't think anybody paid attention to them. In particular there was one loud mouth behind us that was already drunk and screaming "I don't care, I'm gonna have a fucking good time! Whoooo!" It was classic. Kitten and I were determined to ignore him, we were gonna just let him have a good time. A lady in front of us had a different idea.
I'd never been to a Buffet concert before, but beach balls are a big part of the show before it starts. There were at least fifty flying around before everything got started. One bounced up to a lady about three rows in front of us. Drunk guy jumps up and immediately starts screaming "Throw it to me! Fucking throw it to me! Whoooo!" This middle aged lady turns around, takes a look at drunk guy, lifts the beach ball over her head and throws it hard right at his crotch! Drunk guy makes the "OOOF" sound as it bounces off of his junk. Chickie got a standing ovation.

The show was great. Lots of sing along songs. I wish I had a job like Jimmy Buffet. Show up to work in a t-shirt and shorts and goof around in your bare feet for a couple of hours. A dream job for sure.

We made our way home through the rain fine. I took a look in my basement and there was a couple of inches of standing water. No big deal. I picked up the stuff that was in danger of getting ruined and we went to bed.

The next morning the rain was still going full force. There was six inches of water or so in the basement now and it was pouring in every crack and crevice. I looked out the window and the entire backyard was flooded. My moron land lord had blown all of the leaves from the last fall into the drainage ditch and of course now it had formed a primitive dam against the fence. I shot him an email and he said he would have somebody bring over a sump pump for the basement.
By the time the pump got there, the water was up over the first step of the staircase and rising. Kitten and I got out in the rain and she helped me set up the pump. Even after the pump was running the water continued to rise. I easily had eighteen inches in there before the rain let up and the basement started to drain. The washer and dryer were a quarter submerged and the HVAC system was about two inches away from going under. Out back, the force of the water had pushed the leaves against the fence until the fence collapsed.

We were starting to get reports of interstates being flooded so Kitten left fairly early hoping to be able to get home. She called later and said that 65 North was fine, but a lot of the exits were closed due to flooding. She was able to get home fine. I managed to get most of the water pumped out by midnight.


The Cumberland River in downtown Nashville continued to rise, eventually flooding the floor of the arena where Buffet had played two nights before. Even today, 60 or so hour after the rain stopped, there are areas under water and downtown is a mess. The land lord sent somebody out to repair the fence and I'm gonna sort through everything in the basement today to figure out what got ruined. I think I got lucky as far as the flooding goes, but others, not so much.