Cleaned Up! (the car version)

Back from the paint shop, looking foxy!165,000 miles, new paint, new tires, and looking just as cute as a big ol' robin's egg!

Cleaned Up!

Today, for the first time since the fires, I looked out over the ocean and there was no orangy-brown haze over the horizon. We're back to our usual misty marine layer mornings, and the air is breathable. Hooray! In honor, I cleaned the fallen ash off the decks and Daisy and I had breakfast on the front porch.
Each of us has one of our favorite things on the table. Guess whose is whose!

October 2007 Fires

Almost four years to the day after the infamous Cedar Fire, it happened again. Exceedingly dry weather, Santa Ana winds, and all it takes is a spark. The local NPR station, KPBS, created an interactive Google map of the fires that took on a life of its own, becoming the authoritative fire status map. Google sent a team of developers down to work with the local station and it really took on a life as a Google pilot project. Many other news sites linked to it.

The Witch Creek Fire was the largest and scariest, though Stock Dog Ranch (where Daisy and I go to work sheep) was threatened more by the Poomacha Fire that was burning down Palomar Mountain, threatening the Palomar Observatory as well. Fortunately, between the weather and the help from aerial firefighters, the hazard seem to be dialing down.

While we aren't in the line of fire, we get a lot of ash and horrible air quality. The moon was orange and the daylight sky was too. This picture was taken at sunset looking out from our front porch.
Which was covered with a fine, choking ash.
This enhanced satellite photo was taken on Wednesday. I added the little red X to show where we are -- in the plume of smoke from the Witch Creek Fire.
We're in our second day of offshore winds, and today we even had a little bit of rain, so our air is greatly improved!

Vivian comes to town

Vivian came down over her fall break week. The weather was great, and she got some surfing in. A special treat was meeting boyfriend Tyler, who is very, very nice.And good-looking too!
And he likes Tundra. Of course he would never have risen to the level of "boyfriend" if he didn't!
And Daisy learns again to live under the heavy paw of Tundra, and loves it.

Landslide!

Living in California is exciting! On October 3rd, part of Mount Soledad slumped down the hill, taking with it a goodly chunk of Mount Soledad Road, the main street over the mountain, as well as nine houses. These pictures are from the San Diego Union Tribune Picture Gallery, "Mt Soledad Hillside Collapses:"This isn't the first time. Though it wasn't ever talked about, the same hill collapsed when the houses were originally being built in 1961.
Not too far from mom's and sister's houses, either, crudely marked by me with green and purple stars on the Yahoo map. The landslide occurred at the red star.
What next??!!