All Cairsten's fault. *grins*

Name ten of life's simple pleasures that you like most, and then pick ten people to do the same. Try to be original and creative and not to use things that someone else has already used. Also, try not to list "porn" for every answer.

( Read more... )

Since everyone is talking about the weather....

...here's my contribution.

The last truly significant cold snap we had in the Bay Area was in late December of 1990. The most visible impact it had was on the local flora: while native oaks and pines were able to handle the cold (which, I think, had been the worst in 80 years, but I was only 7 then, so how should I know?) the oh-so-prolific eucalyptus imported from Australia were unable to handle the chill. Many of them died.

You know what's wrong with a lot of dead eucalyptus? They are full of oil - so they burn like torches. "Eyewitness accounts testify that a sole ember blew into a tree just outside the burn area, and the tree exploded into flame, and the resulting fire was quickly out of control..."

"...an unusual east wind, at speeds in excess of 65 miles per hour, that raced down from the crest of the Oakland-Berkeley Hills. Coupled with record high temperatures well into the nineties, the hot, dry winds gusted and swirled through five years of drought-dry brush and groves of freeze-damaged Monterey pines and eucalyptus trees. All the conditions for a major disaster were present that morning of October 20, 1991." I know a man who's face was melted in that blaze. His wife got away with less visual disfiguring.

For me, for later: http://www.sfmuseum.org/oakfire/overview.html
Satellite view: http://asapdata.arc.nasa.gov/OaklandFire.jpg