Raining Monkey Wrenches

Radar

Nature’s mid-June turn toward winter continues, prompting a local news anchor to say, "This rain has certainly put a monkey wrench on a lot of special events." I wouldn’t dare try to improve on that.

But by my completely unofficial calculations, the two mild storms that have blown in from the Pacific over the past week may have been enough for Berkeley to break its record from June rainfall. Old record, 1.21 inches, in 1967; total this month: something more than that — a weather station up at the Lawrence Hall of Science, at a higher altitude than the official weather station on the UC campus, says it’s gotten 1.28 inches so far.

In related news: Tom’s last real day of high school was today. The graduation is tomorrow evening. Outdoors at the Hearst Greek Theatre on campus. Beware the meteorological monkey wrench. Kate and I met the Berkeley High principal at the grocery story the other night — sometimes this is a small town — and he said, "Hope it doesn’t rain. But if it does — well, we’ll do it anyway. There’s nowhere else to go."