Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 We could use a monsoon right about now. Nothing but sun and wind on the horizon, probably for months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 is that what irony is? i so want to live in socal one day but the fires, landslides, and to some extent earthquakes makes me think a 6-12mo rental there would be nice one year. You're not rich enough to worry about the first two. _________________ Michael Saulnier -- best of luck to you and your neighbors! I hope you all come through OK! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 You're not rich enough to worry about the first two. At least the second one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 At least the second one. Yeah... and then there's floods. My old house was in a "100 year flood plain" and the Army Corp of Engineers had all kinds of helpful ideas about how to turn Long Beach into the next New Orleans... I was sweeping out the ashes of others' misfortune this morning. My kitchen floor was absolutely gritty under my feet (it was hot yesterday and I snuck a window open a crack) and the counters looked like a dustbowl sidewalk... Here's the layer of smoke/haze hanging over our not necessarily normally pristine harbor (although before they started letting them park sulfur and deisel belching ships in the harbor for days/weeks with their engines idling it was not ANYWHERE this bad in the last few decades): Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members HCarlH Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 is that what irony is? i so want to live in socal one day but the fires, landslides, and to some extent earthquakes makes me think a 6-12mo rental there would be nice one year. You can have my 600 Sq/Ft apartment next year when I move. It will be only $1200/month: no air conditioning but lots of mold, and half the people speak anything but English. California went down hill a while back....be happy where you live. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 yeah, it rained all day today. i almost felt bad but we need it severely as well. not a downpour, more misty wetness. i can make a LOT more money out there than i can here, its a pretty high cost of living here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 You can have my 600 Sq/Ft apartment next year when I move. It will be only $1200/month: no air conditioning but lots of mold, and half the people speak anything but English. California went down hill a while back....be happy where you live. Boy... that makes me feel a little better about my rent. Although I only have two thirds the space, I do have a garage (too small to get my Corolla in, though). And while my rent's just a little under that, I have a two minute walk to the bay and a four minute walk to the ocean. I can see Catalina while standing in the patio in front of my building. Well... not today... Honest, while there are plenty of negatives, I can barely imagine living anywhere else. Or... at least... anywhere else I could afford... PS... I grew up in Orange County -- but it was a very different place when I was a kid. I moved out when I was in college and I haven't considered moving back. (Well, unless you count Seal Beach, where I lived for about 8 years. But it's really a suburb of Long Beach. You just can't tell the newcomers that. They're the ones who moved there because it was a "cute little town filled with cute little bunalows" and then knocked down all the cute little bungalows and put up hideous, paperboard palaces and jampacked shotgun houses they asked a million plus for... it used to be a real nice little town. Once.) OC as it was... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members HCarlH Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Boy... that makes me feel a little better about my rent. Although I only have two thirds the space, I do have a garage (too small to get my Corolla in, though). And while my rent's just a little under that, I have a two minute walk to the bay and a four minute walk to the ocean. I can see Catalina while standing in the patio in front of my building. Well... not today... Long Beach is practically OC. Los Angeles doesn't want Long Beach (too far away)....you should know that by now. I'm only in biking distance of the coast and Balboa. And my apartment is basically storage with a bed and shower. (Not really, but that's how much room I have.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MichaelSaulnier Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Wow. Current tally is over 500 homes burned down... So far my local streets have not been touched. It's still blowing like mad, so it's gonna be a long scary night. Over 250,000 people in mandatory evacuation areas. Sad and ugly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Took a couple of photos from here in Redondo at sunrise. Keep in mind I'm 20 miles away from the nearest blaze, but the smoke is thick in the air, and we have ashes and dust coating everything. Anyway, I assure you the sun is not ordinarily blood red. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 wow you were up late last night.... when i see the sun rise in the morning like that its usually more than just blood red Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 wow you were up late last night.... when i see the sun rise in the morning like that its usually more than just blood red Nah, I'm a business owner with a kid in school. I'm up before the sun every day... at least every weekday. To give non-local people an idea of how widespread this is, here's a recent fire map, with my location indicated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Long Beach is practically OC. Los Angeles doesn't want Long Beach (too far away)....you should know that by now. I'm only in biking distance of the coast and Balboa. And my apartment is basically storage with a bed and shower. (Not really, but that's how much room I have.) I dunno, man, even with my garage, you still have me beat by 100 sq feet. I'll totally agree that LA doesn't want Long Beach -- but we've unfortunatley become trendy so that's dicey. But I can guarantee you that we don't want LA. Maybe it's just the century old rivalry between the cities for dominance (LA won long ago due, they tell me, to manipulations of the water supply, Mulholland, and all that)... but long time LB residents may occasionally have been jealous of LA over some particulars in the past (for decades, the Long Beach "city fathers" did everything they could to crush any sort of local music or entertainment scene -- happily that changed over the last 20 years or so) but most are pretty hard core about the superiority of LB living to LA. But I'll have to argue about LB being "practically OC" -- it's about as far from OC as you can get in most ways (except geographically). The main part of town is old and there's finally a widespread sense that the city's history should be preserved and its early 20th century classic Cal bungalow and pseudo-Spanish style architecture should be preserved. There's a pervasive and resilient boho subculture with a strong working class sensibility; while the university has had its ups and downs (former Uni prez turned GOP politico Steve Horn promised to return it to its "trade school roots" by destroying academic programs and he almost succeeded, under his "guidance" a number of departments lost their accreditation, including, ironically, the business department for a brief time) but it has a resurgent and respected art department and academic programs are rebuilding -- and the presence of 40,000 students there (and another 15,000 or so at Long Beach City) adds to the cultural mix, which is extremely diverse. In addition to a number of musical and theatrical venues, we have our own full time professional symphony orchestra, an on-again-off-again opera company which has generated critical acclaim for its adventurous avant garde stagings, lots of neighborhood coffee houses -- a few of them excellent (including a small shop a one mile walk up the Belmont Shore shopping strip which -- literally surrounded by Starbucks -- has its own roaster and turns out prize winning coffees. Of course, you can't buy music there -- but just two doors down is an incredibly deep contemporary music shop called Fingerprints with a huge selection of truly alternative music (and a great used CD selection, too). But one thing OC does have that LB doesn't is breakers on its beaches. Still, the Surfrider Foundation and local community leaders continue working to remove at least part of the breakwater built off the shore to (over) protect the harbor. I grew up in OC and it was on the cusp of its present shape when I left in the very early 70s. My mom still lives out there and I even have some friends who moved back to old town Orange (which certainly has its charms -- if you stay in old town Orange ). So I know OC pretty good. Long Beach may be adjacent -- but it's a million miles away. Speaking of OC -- one of my favorite spots left there is being challenged by the fire, Silverado Canyon. Of course, the Canyon has been encroached on increasingly by the multi-million dollar homes going up on the hills around it -- and the tiny, 100 year old community has even had its own small version of a building boom -- but it used to be a tiny little enclave of people hiding from the city. The kids from their used to be bussed into school -- and they were, well, country people. They had their own 4 H Club at our school (but only the Silverado kids joined, everyone else thought it was way too square). They even tended to drawl... Silverado has definitely changed over the decades and it's no longer the province of marginal bohos and displaced country folk -- but it's got a charm that has never died for me. I hope mightily that it can be saved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 I dunno, man, even with my garage, you still have me beat by 100 sq feet. Is this the point I start to feel guiltily extravagant in my 1,325 square foot (plus garage) apartment? I will point out that my kid lives here and my business office is here as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Anderton Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Wow. Let's hope for rain. Or at least no wind...when I lived in California my house was threatened by a fire, the fire stopped one ridge away...about 600 feet...it was scary as hell. The weirdest part was waking up and it looked like it had snowed, there was so much ash on the ground. At least with an earthquake you can go through the rubble and pick up some pieces. Fires just take out everything. Good luck, So Cal... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 23, 2007 Moderators Share Posted October 23, 2007 Wow. Let's hope for rain. Or at least no wind...when I lived in California my house was threatened by a fire, the fire stopped one ridge away...about 600 feet...it was scary as hell. The weirdest part was waking up and it looked like it had snowed, there was so much ash on the ground. At least with an earthquake you can go through the rubble and pick up some pieces. Fires just take out everything. Good luck, So Cal... The fires in San Diego are going crazy. I'm home from work as I'm in a "be ready" area. I live on the coast in North County. The Santa Ana winds blow west out of the desert to the ocean. Right now fires are raging in Rancho Sante Fe, 5 miles to the east. The wind and therefore the fire, is heading west straight to my home and family. The air is charcoal grey with no sun and the ground is covered wih snowlike ash. Covered. No mandatory evacuation has be issued here yet but the bags are packed and we're ready to move... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members meccajay Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Whats scary about all this, is even a bling man can see there's a big change happening. -Rampant wildfires in CA.-Warm fall temps in Chicago, Northeast etc.-GA lakes drying up with 80 day supply of water left(GA is practically a rainforest!).-Melting iceburgs...etc etc. Something is changing on the planet, and it's happening fast...real fast! Somebody please take the politics out of the global warming conversation, and lets discuss what needs to be done! If there's anything we can do?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Is this the point I start to feel guiltily extravagant in my 1,325 square foot (plus garage) apartment? I will point out that my kid lives here and my business office is here as well. Whoa... what do you do with all that room? Damn... you could set up a polo field or something! Yah... when I first saw this place (the only apartment on top of three tiny garages), I knew it was gonna be a tight squeeze. But I reminded myself that I'd developed a lifestyle in my old house (a 1450 sq ft duplex with me in the front 2 BR house and my rescue cats [adopted out in the absolute nick of time, less than a week before closing and handing over the keys] that consisted of me sitting in my little studio/office 16 hours a day and falling asleep in the living room on the couch [though I had a really nice bedroom]... and I thought, what the hell, no impact... And, while glowing sparks were literally drifting down into my old backyard during the '92 riots, the tradeoff with my new apartment put me here, two blocks edgewise from the bay and a block and a block and a half to the beach: Now... if we could just get those breakers back... PS... the sand is not that white... guaranteed. I mean... this is Long Beach, not Hawaii... But you will get a nice protective coat of oil if you go swimming -- and that's valuable, right? It'll help keep you warm if you decide to set out swimming for Catalina and cut down on drag, too... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 The fires in San Diego are going crazy. I'm home from work as I'm in a "be ready" area. I live on the coast in North County. The Santa Ana winds blow west out of the desert to the ocean. Right now fires are raging in Rancho Sante Fe, 5 miles to the east. The wind and therefore the fire, is heading west straight to my home and family. The air is charcoal grey with no sun and the ground is covered wih snowlike ash. Covered. No mandatory evacuation has be issued here yet but the bags are packed and we're ready to move... Best of luck, Lee! My thoughts and prayers are with your family and your neighbors and everyone who is threatened by these fires. And with the heroic struggle of the firefighters to save people's homes and what they can of the natural habitat... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Whoa... what do you do with all that room? Damn... you could set up a polo field or something! Heh heh... it's a three bed, two bath, with one room designated as my office/studio. In my defense, my slumlord doesn't charge what you'd think, and in return the place is regularly falling apart (you get what you pay for, as always). Back on topic, the air is {censored}ty with smoke today. It's burning my eyes when I walk outside, and the local schools have wisely cancelled outdoor activities that involve physical exertion. I mean, I'm a SMOKER and it's bugging the crap out of me. I can only imagine how bad it is for people who like to actually breathe air on a regular basis. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Whats scary about all this, is even a bling man can see there's a big change happening.-Rampant wildfires in CA.-Warm fall temps in Chicago, Northeast etc.-GA lakes drying up with 80 day supply of water left(GA is practically a rainforest!).-Melting iceburgs...etc etc.Something is changing on the planet, and it's happening fast...real fast! Somebody please take the politics out of the global warming conversation, and lets discuss what needs to be done! If there's anything we can do?! You bet. But there remain a hard core of people who insist that -- because there's a certain amount of uncertainty about how much man's activities are contributing to climate change that we should just go on f------ up this pretty little planet as fast as we can... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Heh heh... it's a three bed, two bath, with one room designated as my office/studio. In my defense, my slumlord doesn't charge what you'd think, and in return the place is regularly falling apart (you get what you pay for, as always). Back on topic, the air is shitty with smoke today. It's burning my eyes when I walk outside, and the local schools have wisely cancelled outdoor activities that involve physical exertion. I mean, I'm a SMOKER and it's bugging the crap out of me. I can only imagine how bad it is for people who like to actually breathe air on a regular basis. I'm sure you've tried quitting... it took me a number of times to make it stick (I had to do a variant of the 12 step strategy... putting up a day-by-day resistance to the temptation to just have one...) I don't want to put too fine a point on this but I lost my dad to smoking 21 years ago. He'd just retired and had big plans... I can't help but think about you and your kid... ______________ PS... back to more pleasant topics: landlords. My landlord is a nice guy who hasn't done a thing to my place in the nearly four years I've been here except raise the rent. I have no doubt that my building is the "white trash palace" of the neighborhood. That said, my neighbors are extremely gracious and friendly. One guy even managed to find my apartment (sort of hidden in back) to let me know the street sweeper was coming one morning when I spaced out on the sweeper schedule (a nearly $40 ticket). You see the BMWs and shiny SUVs and you think, gosh, I'll be these people really have sticks up them -- but I was quite pleasantly surprised. That's the diff between Belmont Shore and Newport Beach, I guess... (Don't get me wrong, I love the Newport Peninsula and spent some important growing up time on their wide, clean beaches, bodysurfing their large and considerably less oily breakers. ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 I'm sure you've tried quitting... I'm sure you're mistaken. No, I've never tried. Speaking of smoke... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 To give you an idea of scale, those plumes are extending west at least 1,000 miles. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ultravibe Posted October 23, 2007 Members Share Posted October 23, 2007 Reading about all this, I'm amazed there have been no deaths reported yet - praying that it stays that way. Hope the firefighter injuries stay to a minimum, too. Praying for all of you out there, too. Stay well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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