Is it time to move yet?

I think it is no secret that I ABHOR wind. Every year in fall the Santa Anas whip through southern California, leaving me feeling dry, staticky, dusty and miserable. Give me rain or snow any day over wind! But really, the worst of it is that the combination of gusty winds and the dry desert climate of So Cal makes the perfect recipe for wild fires.

Last summer, the Zaca Fire (which broke out about 40 miles north of where we live) burned for nearly 2 months. It was one of the longest-burning fires in So Cal. Ash would still be blowing in months later.

Then this past summer, there was the Gap Fire, which was REALLY close to home-- I could see the mountains behind work ablaze! The sun was not to be seen behind the haze of smoke. Air wasn't fun to breathe, either. We lost power intermittently for several days, including at work. The car wash service that comes to our company every Friday was swamped the following week, with people bringing their ash-covered cars in to be cleaned.

Fast forward to my parents' home last month, where we were getting ready for our trip to Indonesia. Allan and Todd arrived Sunday afternoon to see us off, spend the night, and then hit Disneyland the next day. My parents and I departed Sunday night, and Allan told me the story of the rest: being rousted at 6am the next morning by rescue personnel who were evacuating the area. Fortunately, my parents' house and the rest of the neighborhood survived intact-- despite the fire burning along hills that were only a couple hundred feet away! We returned home to the sight of blackened hills and black ash EVERYWHERE. That was the Marek Fire. If you scroll down the pictures and look at the map view with all the dots, my parents' home is a little below the "o" in "San Fernando". Talk about close call!

And then... there was last night. The Tea Fire broke out in Montecito, which is less than 20 miles south of where we live. Far enough away, but too close for comfort, esp given the heavy winds. We had no TV, but we could peek out our kitchen window and see the faraway hills burning. In fact, we only initially learned about it by reading local friends' Facebook statuses! Wonderful thing, this here Interwebs ;-) Pray for winds to die down today so the risk of the fire spreading way out of control is minimized.

So yeah. I'm sick of winds. I'm sick of fires, ash and smoky air. Are we ready to move yet? ;-P