I’ve spent most of the past few days in Granbury to cover the flooding along the Brazos River.

It’s been heartening in a puzzling way. I went to the Red Cross shelter and started talking to a woman who had come to ask some questions about how to deal with insurance and whom she could hire to clean up her house.

She showed me video on her cell phone of a raging river that had replaced her back yard. Quite rationally, she explained that she had to get together with the neighbors to figure out whose belongings had been washed into which yard.

And she’s not talking about a lemonade pitcher, either. One of the neighbor’s barns washed into her yard. A barn.

She would then explain that several feet of water would come into her house and damage her kitchen table.

“My son’s got straps around it and glued it and pieced it back together. Saved me several dollars.” She started laughing hysterically when she realized that she had saved a few bucks on a table in a house that was no longer habitable.

I’ve often been surprised at how enthusiastic some people greet me after a disaster. I think they may just like the chance to tell their story.

A couple of years ago, I covered a tornado in Oklahoma City with Kix Brooks for some reason. The two of us interviewed the governor, but we also went out and talked to some people in a neighborhood that was damaged.

One woman whose house was now a pile of rubble came out to greet us.

“Welcome to our home. It’s kind of messy,” she laughed and looked at her husband. “I don’t think we have any coffee, though.”

So off I’d go to Granbury each day, loading a CD for the drive. Note to America’s youth: a “CD” is what people used to listen to music in the car before the Zune.

It might seem strange that I listen to music instead of my station while I driving, you know, a station car. Once, during open window season a few years ago, a woman who was stopped next to me at a red light started hollering at me. She heard me playing some Creedence or Traveling Wilburys or something and asked why I wasn’t listening to WBAP.

“Just taking a break!” I yelled back, and she laughed as the light turned. I feel very strongly that Rush Limbaugh wouldn’t mind me turning off the station. I bet he rocks out to some “Cool Dry Place” during commercials.

But here’s the problem: most of my CDs were destroyed in the mythical car crash. Only a few remained. Luckily, though, one of them is my driving CD.

This is a CD loaded with the up-tempo hits of America’s favorite artists, like Elvis and Creedence Clearwater Revival. It’s not so much a CD that I would want to sing along with, it’s a CD that keeps my energy up when I’m blasting across the prairie of Hood County.

Tell me hearing “Creedence Clearwater Revival” doesn’t make you want to belt out, “I ain’t no senator’s son, SON.” Go ahead, Tell me. And I’ll tell you that you’re a liar.

I think if a lot of us really look inward, we’ll realize that rocking out to some Creedence can take the edge off a long drive. And now that I think of it, this is the second straight blog in which I’ve made a reference to Big Lebowski.

It’s also advantageous because it’s not a CD that makes me want to sing along. I feel like it would look unprofessional to look inside a car with a news station’s logo plastered on the outside and see the reporter belting out a tune, even if it is a Roy Orbison number and even if that reporter has won an impressive number of awards.