After the Rain.

Byline: Rob Long

Los Angeles has so many ways to fall apart: riots, fires, earthquakes. But the thing that really makes us go nuts out here is rain.

There's been a lot lately. Hillside houses have begun to slip and buckle in the wet earth. Swimming pools have come sliding down the canyons like enormous greased-up bathtubs. Seven of my neighbors report leaky ceilings and flooded windowsills. And California houses aren't built with mudrooms and front hallways--places where people in other climates hang up raincoats and umbrellas. Soggy piles of clothes by the front door, clumped on a couple of beach towels? No wonder the town is freaking out.

We're Angelenos, after all. We came here for the Mediterranean temperatures and the bright yellow sunshine, for all-year tennis and February rounds of golf. We like to eat outside and drive with the top down and smell night-blooming jasmine, not dash through calf-high puddles in the parking lot. "This isn't L.A.!" a woman shouted out at my local yoga studio. It was the fifth straight day of rain, and the big windows were steamed over and the floor was slick from dripping ponchos. "This is... this is... Seattle !" she shouted with a combination of horror and rage. "I left Seattle!"

Solid days and nights of sheeting downpours have backed up storm drains along the freeways, creating curbside ponds of alarming depth. In the dark they're impossible to see, and we Angelenos, who tend to be dreamy and distracted drivers anyway, clicking away on our BlackBerrys and chatting merrily on our cell phones as we zip along--well, we plow right into them with our Range Rovers and BMWs, spraying huge arcs of water 10 meters in both directions. I passed a Prius hybrid car that had tried to do the same. ...