Firstly, congratulations! Secondly, no, this recent rainfall has not been "normal". The average precipitation level for Las Vegas during the month of September is 0.3 inches, so when parts of the valley received almost an inch in one day from Sept. 12-13, that was definitely not the norm, although it was also nothing near the highest level on record, which occurred between Aug. 20-21, 1957, when 2.59 inches fell in a 24-hour period.
During the course of the past week, we've had reports of flooding on the Strip in the vicinity of CityCenter and the Imperial Palace; flash-flood warnings became an almost daily occurrence; motorists were rescued in more than one location when water levels reached to car-window height; a home on 15th street downtown between Fremont and Charleston reportedly had more than a foot of water inside, while a home in West Las Vegas caught fire last Tuesday from a lightning strike (20 trees were also reported felled by strikes); last Tuesday, so much rain fell at Tropical and Walnut, near Aliante Station, that officials shut down the intersection and crews cut a hole in the street to attempt to drain the water; some areas of the valley even reported downpours of hail! Definitely not normal.
The good news, however, is that the forecast for this weekend, borne out by reality so far, is for hot and dry weather. Nice.
As to the second part of your question, regarding what locals do during storms, the answer is that the smart ones among us stay indoors, whenever possible. Las Vegas is notorious for both flash floods and bad drivers, so heavy downpours are not times to be on the streets, if you can possibly help it.
That said, last Sunday the current writer was downtown with Anthony Curtis and had just sampled a very fine Bloody Mary at Bar + Bistro (a new addition to the soon-to-be-released 2012 edition of Eating Las Vegas -- pick up the 2011 edition right now for a steal!) when the heavens opened and, within a couple of minutes, the waters were lapping at the pavement and we were ankle-deep in water. The view out of the glass doors was of a tropical monsoon. Hence, the sensible thing to have done would've been to sit tight for a few before attempting to head to our next venue, but we live in a desert here and rain (even for this Brit. ex-pat) is a welcome novelty. So, we took our lives into our hands and made a run for it through the cascades (there were torrents off the roof that gave the cascading waterfall showers in the spa at JW Marriott a run for their money) and made it into the car ... just as the sun came out. That's us crazy locals for you.
