Red Moon

I went in to work today, and on my drive home, I noticed the nearly full moon as it appears behind a sky of smoke. The colors here are not altered, and this is pretty darned close to the way it looks tonight. I tried a longer exposure, but with the whole earth rotation thing going on, it just ended up like a blur.

I suppose a Red Moon poem would be appropriate here, but I just don't got it in me. I did find a poem online that sounded pretty cool, though its a bit too otherworldly for my taste.

If you have one to share, please do!

Smoke to the South

The winds have died down, but now the smoke is descending on us. This is what we got to see when we got up this morning (looking southeast here - San Diego is due south):



That reddish-orange glow is where the sun is supposed to be. My office is closed again today. Looking to the west, it looks like the end of the world:



So far we've fared pretty well. The most we suffered is a broken tree from the gale force winds we've been having:



Right now, the winds are eerily calm, and there is a kind of unpleasant heat coming from everywhere at once. The smell of smoke is slight right now, but it will likely get worse as it descends on Temecula. I'm surprised they're letting the kids go to school here. At least the lack of wind will help the firefighters do their job.

Wildfires and Santa Ana

Man, these Santa Ana winds are insane. They've already broken off a big chunk of one of my trees in the backyard, and destroyed a couple of EZ-ups in our neighborhood. Still, I'll take that over the fires that are engulfing the areas to the north and south of us right now. There is so much stuff in the air, your eyes water when you go outside, and visibility is terrible.

Right now, I'm just hoping we aren't evacuated, like so many other Southern Californians right now! If these damned winds would just die down, the firefighters could do their jobs.