This post doesn't have much to do with marketing, but it has everything to do with the way some of us have been working the past few days....

It's been raining cats and dogs for the past five days in Massachusetts, and the Merrimack Valley—where I live—has been in the center of the torrent. Rivers are cresting over dams and seawalls, residents close to them are being evacuated, flooded roads are blocked, basements are filling up, and schools are closed.

Thankfully, I haven't been displaced, or worse. My business or home hasn't been ruined, as those of others have. But I am like so many people in New England, who, in a practical sense, are dealing with the daily stuff of life under slightly more anxious and crazed conditions. It's not a flood of biblical proportion, but in an era when life is a constant balancing act of working full time, caring for children, walking the dog, and making sure that the fridge is stocked with food and the bowls are full of kibble... a little flooding goes a long way to upsetting the balance, fraying nerves and creating stress.

In a practical sense, in my own world, this means that the parking lots of those grocery stores that are open are stacked with cars and the stores are slammed with people. It means that my kids are home... and inside...and restless. It means that my basement is filling up with water, and there's no where to pump it. It means that a simple trip anywhere necessitates nothing short of GPS and mariner’s compass to navigate around flooded roads and cut-throughs; and it means that my dogs are incredulous about being put outside—however briefly—to pee, and one or two have voted in favor of the living room carpet.

As I write this at about 5 PM EST, it's raining again. But this afternoon, the sun poked through the clouds briefly, and the forecast is that the weather will gradually improve over the next day or two. But here's a sense of what it left in its literal wake.

Andover, Mass., from Boston.com:

Trying to get to the grocery store, from Boston.com:

Mill buildings in Lawrence, Mass.:

Tewksbury, Mass.:

Near my favorite spot in the world, in southern Maine:

And finally, my back deck. Maisy as the Mascot of Wet Dogs Everywhere, forced outside for a brief few moments (note the extension cords, connected to sump pumps):