Adios, El Nino

Mountain of mud crashes through the wall and smothers the bed you slept in last night?

You are alive. So plant a kiss on your sweetie.

Mobile home park so flooded you were carried out piggy-back style before the news cameras?

No need to be embarrassed.

Just smile and wave.

No, not every shred of El Nino’s wrath made it into the headlines.

We all had those personal moments, the ones that will no doubt make coffee-table chatter for years to come.

Of course, the coffee table was nowhere to be seen in Ben and Marilyn Lane’s Solimar Beach home, where towering January waves proved no match for a silly glass door.

Marilyn Lane threw out her arms, let out a scream and noted how, maybe, they should have put plastic over the furniture that morning.

“Don’t worry,” Ben Lane replied. “We have insurance.”

An old cliche maybe, but the worst of the winter did tend to bring out the best in us. Calm over stress, grace under pressure.

Craig Welling knew there were only so many ways to clear a mud-clogged street drain near Lynn Road in Thousand Oaks.

So the Conejo Valley Parks and Recreation worker grabbed a pail and lugged out the soupy mess--one bucket at a time.

Tow-truck driver Martin Henderson had a stalled car to pull. The 2 feet of water between him and driver Paul Murphy’s pickup didn’t matter.

And if you are Hunter Patterson, 9, some big bad El Nino is no match for your childhood ingenuity.

If you just pull the whole raincoat over your head, it keeps you drier.

No stress at all.