The rain came down in buckets Thursday — a real old-fashioned Southwestern Virginia gully-washer.

I didn’t see the approaching clouds. Had my head glued to a video monitor editing a documentary but a building-rocking rumble of thunder sent me to the window of the studio to see sheets of water falling from the skies.

This was the first hard rain since regrading my driveway with the new DR PowerGrader. How, I wondered, would the surface hold up under the pounding rainfall?

I drove home with a mixture of hope and dread. The rain had just ended as I turned off Sandy Flats Road and headed up Greenbrier to check out the driveway.

Everything was fine. No ruts, no dislodged gravel, no erosion. No need to hook up the grader and do any repair work when the water dries.

Sumbitch. The thing really works.