Checking in from SW OR. We were set to evac Tuesday, but never got the call. We are much more fortunate than other families around our area, many of whom had to evacuate as a fire burned down residences and businesses. (Feels kind of strange being on this side instead of telling people to evacuate.) Since the east winds stopped, we've been in thick smoke, mostly from large fires in northern CA and a couple smaller ones nearby. Right now, we have west winds aloft but the surface remains still and smoky. Winds should drop down and scour some of the smoke out overnight (sorry eastern OR, ID, and MT). Tomorrow, as the existing fires get some cleaner air, more sunshine, and a bit of wind, they should become more active, but not like earlier this week. Maybe by Thursday/Friday we'll get a little moisture. Looks like by the first week of October, fire danger should be receding in most places. Of course, California always has to worry about wind events into November. This east wind event blew a hole in a lot of our communities and forests across CA, OR, and WA. It will take a long time to recover and some special places will never be the same, at least in the Anthropocene.
Changed our purifier's filter, but it literally can't keep up anymore, fam. They say keep your doors and windows closed, but physics doesn't stop. Eventually, equilibrium means that your air inside is as shitty as the air outside. Eyes and nose burning in our own house, and it isn't even the dog farts this time.
In addition to the regular system, we have three 20x20 box fans with 20x20 filters taped to them running. We started them on Tuesday and now there are visible black circles on the filters. We'll change out tomorrow or Tuesday.
Thanks, rim. I've been telling everyone about this hack. Glad to have you vouch for it too. Take good care.
We were at Lee's Ferry, Arizona, not far from Page where 89a two-lane highway crosses the Colorado. Sunday afternoon through Tuesday morning, and we would have loved to stay longer. When we arrived: beautiful weather and views. By Monday night into Tuesday morning, things were pretty obscured by the westerly "California" wind bringing in the smoke. Then as we headed south to Sedona that front kicked in. We were mostly lucky with the wind and weather but for that day or so, but it was really something when you're hundreds of miles from a fire and the smoke was still quite a factor. In California, "wind" becomes a new "four-letter word". Here on the Gulf Coast, too much water. I told Californians we met at North Rim, Grand Canyon ("our state's on fire") that if we could build a pipeline for water from the Gulf Coast to California.....
Fuggin do nothins will always win. They just need millions of dollars in counter messaging to, without shame, sit tight and let someone else clean up the mess. I'm not sure if they have children or raise them to give a **** about them once the broodlings are emancipated, but I guess this hoarding of money and effort fit precisely into their retirement plan and me-first lifestyles. And when they die, they take that horded money with them into heaven.
air quality might sees improvement over the weekend ,itchy throat and light headache hopefully will go away. ,I was't anticipating this impact of gender reveal parties from our neighbors in the south to fertilize my own lungs
Hey! Keep that idea to yourself. ;-) Seriously, you won't find many folks in Central Texas on board with that. This year hasn't been terribly dry, but it's an outlier. Overall, the last decade has been brutal when it comes to rain. Like not remotely enough of the stuff. You should see our water bill! Maybe if the pipeline ran from Louisiana? I know some Cajuns who might give that a thumbs up. That's crazy!
This was part of my answer to 'how to make plants grow in the desert' when I was in grade school. Sea water would be delivered to desalinization plants. My teacher laughed at me. Who's laughing now, b****!?!? (because she's probably dead from old age)
Well, since the New Green Deal is a resolution with not actual plan, who knows what it would cost. Especially when the text talks about "the world" and not the United States, so good luck. Additionally, some of the high level proposals would cost 10s of Trillions of dollars, while "returning" hundreds of billions in benefit. Of course, the New Green Deal means jack squat, because while the US has been consistently reducing emissions anyways, as we get more efficient through good, open markets...China, India, and Russia are increasing their carbon emissions exponentially, nullifying any affect a US law would do anyways. So basically we'd be costing ourselves a giant chunk of our economy, putting ourselves as an competitive disadvantage, with little actual effect on the climate. Additionally, multiple scientific sources say that the bulk of the cause of the fires is the following: 1. Poor forest management. By "saving" every tree and cutting back on forest maintenance costs (controlled burns, brush clearing, etc.) CA and other Pac NW states have basically created a giant kindling area. 2. The Smokey Bear effect: by the US Government fighting every small fire, they've inturrupted the natural clearing of the forest by mother nature...again, creating huge amounts of kindling. 3. Eucalyptus trees in CA are basically match sticks (look up the Australia scam that netted us millions of mature eucalyptus trees on the West Coast) 4. Finally, climate. Alternating wet years (where lots of vegetation grows) and dry years (where stuff burns). This, however, can be chalked up MORE to strong El Nino and La Nina patterns over the last 20 years, which have little, if anything to do with overall climate change.
Well, there certainly are multiple angles for one to talk themselves into some sort of an attempt of moral justification for not wanting us to act on climate change. A challenge well accepted by many.
FX (pretty sure it's FX) has a great NYT documentary about the Australia wildfires that is really well done.