I'm worrying about the rain, just worrying about the rain

Whoever writes, speaks in public or otherwise openly makes any statement about the weather does so at their great peril. Just ask anyone who has dared to do it.

Legend has it that the biblical figure Noah once argued with a neighbor about the weather, saying he could feel in his bones that it was going to rain. The neighbor scoffed at the idea and argued that it almost never rained in their neighborhood.

As we all know, dark clouds later appeared on the horizon and rain fell for weeks until it covered Earth. Poor Noah barely had time to build his great ark and gather on board a male and female of every species, saving himself, his family and the animal kingdom from the Great Flood. Everyone else perished, including the quarrelsome neighbor.

Ok, I made up that bit about the neighbor, but you get the idea, don't you?

Some of you might remember I once wrote about telling my young boys before we came to Beijing that the winters brought plenty of snow to play with and their subsequent disappointment on finding that it almost never snows in Beijing.

And what happened the week after that was published? Snow. The heaviest (though still a bit sparse) snowfall I've seen yet in Beijing.

Let's just take it as established fact that to speak of the weather is to tempt fate ... but I just can't stop myself.

At work last night (I'm writing this on Aug 12), my colleagues told me that rain of biblical proportions would fall for three days and three nights.

Now that would be a problem. Unlike many of my foreign colleagues, I don't live at the China Daily compound, but a few kilometers away.

Is anyone familiar with the 1952 classic Hollywood film Singing in the Rain? I'm just not as easygoing as Gene Kelly. You won't catch me blithely skipping through deep puddles and dancing with my umbrella on the way to work and back.

Take a taxi? I still have too healthy a fear of COVID-19 to voluntarily place myself in small closed space with a stranger.

So I awoke much too early this morning and began a fitful vigil at the windows, checking the weather and hoping for the best, but fearing the worst.

It wouldn't be the first time I got stuck in a downpour on my way to work. Once last spring, I got caught when an initial light sprinkling turned into a deluge so copious that by the time I was halfway there, I was trudging through ankle-deep pools.

When I reached the newsroom, every bit of my clothing disgorged trails of water behind me. Every step I took went accompanied by a resounding SQUISH!

When it came time to leave for work today, the afternoon's pelting rainfall had moderated to just a light shower. I was hopeful, but mindful, too, of what happened that time last spring.

I found a share-bike and set out, one hand on the handlebar, the other holding an umbrella. It was slow-going, but I arrived not too wet and in not too much time.

For the past few hours, I've kept my mind focused on news items. That is, until a few minutes ago, when a colleague-who lives on the compound-told me he was running out to do a quick errand because of heavy rain that came as expected this evening, he wouldn't be able to do it later.

So what's the Beijing weather forecast for tonight? One-hundred percent chance of heavy rain.