and it Continues...

Palos Verdes Fire

Of course, since this is FIRE SEASON rather than NOT FIRE SEASON, things have escalated...



Last night Rancho Palos Verdes area was hit.. this area is so congested with trees and expensive homes that they actually flew the firefighting planes at night. A very ballsy move. This one is better today, but not gone. This one is much closer than all the rest. This is where I go to have lunch every now and then because there's a great little Japanese restaurant and the view is terrific. I have decided, tho', that Catalina Island is moving closer every day... but that's for another time.


La Canada fire... last night..
Next we have the La Canada Flintridge fire ... that's Canyada, not like the country. This is the biggest and baddest in a while. I have many pictures of this one taken from my area. The plume is incredible because there is, thankfully, no wind to speak of. You can see it in the pictures even though I am about 40 miles (and several mountain ranges) from the fire. This is the one that is not contained.

The La Canada fire from Sepulveda (route 1, essentially) I couldn't get closer to the corner, but the plume is incredible, so I moved to the shopping center close by.. and took this.

Remember, I'm more than 40 miles away from this..

So I went to the airport where there is a great overlook, but by then, two miles closer, I was 'in' the pollution, so the clarity of the plume is not as good... or bad...

You can see the pall of smoke... some of which is from the Azusa fire..

Then there's the 'Hemet" fire (it has another cute name, but I call them all names I can't repeat here, so it won't help for me to use either name). The Hemet fire is up in the hills to the south and east of me. Another bad area for a fire because, like the La Canada fire, it's hard to fight.

Then there's the fire above Azusa.. north and east of me. It's causing the most air pollution (the sky here is brown, even at the beach). again, about 45 miles away. No pictures.

Plus, there are fires way north of here, in the Santa Barbara area (started by marijuana growers), and more up the coast.

God I hate California during Fire Season...

Oh wait..

God I hate California...

There, that's better...

and don't even get me started on this guy who took the little girl for 18 years...

I'm forming a committee to visit him on a regular basis and stick pointy things into him. Lots and lots of pointy things.

Anyone want to join?

Sunset on a Smokey Thursday...

For all of you who think the southland is great...

There IS this...

it was 91 degrees at the airport today (it's on the coast), and 113 or so in Palm Springs.

and the orangey brown shtuff?

it's smoke... and I'm only a couple of blocks from the ocean, so that's hanging all over the water.

Remember, we only have two seasons here:

Fire and not fire.

August Showers..

Nope. Not raining, although we need it a bunch. We're on rationing and it sucks and I will be rationed probably as much as the SEVENTEEN PEOPLE who live in the same land area next to me..

But I digress.

My sister thew the proverbial shower for my niece this weekend. I stopped by to give the expectant mommy a little something, and everything looked waaay cute, but there was an overload of hormones all over the place, and I'm a 'rather be in the company of testosterone' kind of gal...

If you remember, I did a little box full of onesies and socks and stuff for my niece to open in front of Mom, who seemed to enjoy it. At the time my niece, new to all of this, asked a simple question born of her generation..

' Does she only get to wear pink or yellow or green?".. or something like that.

A simple question, yet a provocative one.

Does she??



Turns out she doesn't...

Hence the "I'M WITH THE BAND" onesie.

and while I was there, I found a pink onesie that wasn't just another pink onesie...

and little booties...

and a really cool hat!

and wait until you see the new socks..

but that's for another time...

Baby Stuff and My Clever Sister...

YES , the SQUARE HEADED ONE...

It turns out I'm not the only genius/creative one in my family. I've known this but haven't shared it with you as much as I should. She, actually, is more talented than I.

Wait.

That may or may not be true, but she is a great deal more focused and patient, which means that her talent ACCOMPLISHES things.

Mine is a tad more eclectic and occasional... I blame it on the ADHD.

Anyways,

She made this cute blankie/quilt for a baby shower unrelated to my niece's baby. As you might have guessed, they're in the Navy! It's a cell phone picture, but you can still see how cute it is.



It's pretty, and the underside looks soft enough to live in.

I'm moving in tomorrow... I may want one for camping (but I want some Coast Guard Shtuff on it!).

OH... and a matching little shirt...

A Glassblower's Dream...

I'm still studying the creating of images. So far I've got the programs to create something from nothing, but lack the expertise (and no, we aren't talking smarts here, I've got PLENTY of those.. no... honest!) to figure out the program! So, until then, all we get is another pretty glass warp thing..

I like this..

a lot.

Cozy Breakfast...

I got a late start this Sunday. which means all my usual breakfast places were busy.

Too busy for me to enjoy a leisurely breakfast.

So I headed to an occasional place I haven't visited in a while:

The Cozy Cafe.

It's on the main drag ( Sepulveda, aka Pacific Coast Highway, aka route 1) in Redondo Beach.

It's the smallest restaurant I know, maybe 20 ft square. Actually, it may be less than that on one side. There is a small kitchen and a U shaped counter that seats about 11 people. They've added a back patio sometime, which is also small and kind of dark, but in general, it's a fun place to have breakfast.

and you meet a lot of people, cuz you're really really close!

Kitty Escher...

My sister asked me what would happen if I played with one of the kitty pictures, so I tried.

I like it! One of the kids on the website (Kongregate) asked how I did it...

Dang...

I hate it when that happens, cuz I had to go back and figure out what I did.

I'm a child of happenstance, you know, not planning!