It used to be that summer afternoons on the Front Range of Colorado frequently featured thunderstorms, but then a long-term drought took hold, the summer storms became much rarer, and Colorado became frighteningly dry for approximately the first two decades of the 21st century. Yes this has been a wet year, and a welcome return to the old normal, but will that persist in the face of climate change or are we just seeing a brief respite before the "new normal" of warmer, drier weather returns? Plus many areas along the Front Range are depleting their aquifers at an unsustainable rate, drought or not.