friday, june 8, 2001
gray heat

today was a typical sunny, almost summer southern california day. that is to say, it was hot, sunny and gray. yes gray, not thunderstorm cloudy. no, that would be nice in comparison. this is the hazy gray that results from too much smog and not enough wind to disburse it. it was so bad that the mountains were pretty invisible until you were right on top of them. Gray enough to make the eyes and throat and nose sting the minute you step outside. and gray may not be the correct word here...it was more like a hazy brown. the kind that lays so think on the city that if you are on your way down from the mountains it looks like a blanket covering the valley and you seriously reconsider going back up the way you came, and maybe even farther.

and people want to move out here? for god's sake, WHY?

this is going to be a hot, expensive, smoggy, horrid summer. i am only looking forward to it because i will be out of classes and not actuality have to step out of my house to do anything unless i really want to. this doesn't help avoid the expense and the possibility of california going bankrupt before august, but i will be cooler and away from the brown air we breath. by then we'll be cutting the stuff with a knife.

not that fall will be much better, but at least september is after the hottest months of the year. it won't truly cool down out here till october sometime, and even then we can expect something of an indian summer shortly there after. the one advantage of fall versus summer: wind. wind that's makes a 90 degree day seem closer to 85 and clears the brown stuff from the skies.

don't get me wrong, it's still hot and often humid and unpleasant, but it's better than fire hazard, cancerous summer.

so don't get any ideas. if you come out to visit, make sure you plan to go home. and take someone with you. we get enough people doing that we might just be able to breath in this state again!

;)