Red Skies At Night

We live in a region that is experiencing a lot of wildfires. Most of them have been started by dry lightening. At least one of them is growing, but because of the location and the history of the area, attempts to fight it are very limited.

None of these fires is currently threatening our home or any of our famiily's or friend's homes, but the wind is bringing the smoke from all of them into our area. For some towns, this has caused sever air quality issues, and amazingly enough, as smoking as it looks and smells out there, our particular spot (as of this moment, it is supposed to change this afternoon), is considered to still be within normal ranges.

Sunset from Gma's, those are not clouds

The other day, before the smoke had really moved into the area, you could see a huge swath of it across the horizon as it blotted out the sun at sunset and darkened the north end of the valley.

Left is basic normal day, hills can be seen. Right is yesterday after wind shift, can barely see end of block.

This pic is a comparison of our view from the front deck looking towards the nearby hills, that you can see on the left side and can't see in the right side. Right now, it doesn't look like we have any hills or mountains surrounding us when we live in the nook of two different mountain ranges. I would not want to be flying a plane or helicopter in this stuff, that is for sure.

Sunrise this morning over the neighbors yard

This last pic is of the rising sun over the top of our neighbors yard this morning, while we are still in the "green" for air quality...can't imagine what it is going to be like later today after the wind shifts start to bring more of the smoke from these fires into our valley.
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Eight Years Ago on In My Words...Kiss Ass Lightening

Purple Plums Abound

This pic is of a colander full of purple plums off our tree in front of the house. This is the third one of these that I have filled in the last week, and the second in two days. For some reason, the birds and other wildlife are not picking the plums like they did last year, and we also seem to have way more plums than last year as well...this adds up to a very droopy tree as you can see.

I have been picking as fast as I can, and one thing I have noticed is that there are lots of ripe plums up there and they are still kind of hard to pick...so I am wondering if we have a mutant year going on and the ripe plums are not dropping like they should. I think I am going to pit them and try freezing them for use in smoothies later. No way I can eat all these fresh, that is for sure. Oh, and I swallow the pits usually, which apparently isn't all that good for me...luckily, I don't chew the pits so I am a bit safer.

I spent some time last night after picking for eating, cleaning up around the bottom of the tree so we don't end up with a bunch of mushrooms and fruit flies...lots of fun!
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Five Years Ago on In My Words...Geocaching On The Road

Best Day Of My Life

21 years ago on this date, I married my best friend and the love of my life. It has been an amazing adventure and I wouldn't trade any of it. Love you J, always and forever!
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Eight Years Ago on In My Words...Swing Of Things

Poor Plum Tree

This is what our poor Purple Plum tree in the front yard looks like. It is so droopy, because it has a gazillion plums on it (I do not exaggerate). I have been trying to pick some of them, but it is not enough to keep up. I keep hoping that the birds or racoons will start eating them like they did last year to reduce the load. They are eating off the one across the street and the one in our backyard...(in fact caught three racoons in that backyard tree a few nights ago snacking).

Soon enough, the plums will get overripe and start to drop on their own. I need to get out and pick another batch before that happens so they can be enjoyed. I am also going to have my hands full picking up the fallen ones as much as I can to keep the ground from under the tree from getting all rotty and full of fruit flies.
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Four Years Ago on In My Words...Bring On The Heat
We hit 104 here today so this one makes sense

Warm Again

We are heating up again, starting today. Need to put some water in the pool since the evaporation rate seems to be higher than normal with this heat, and the chlorine maintenance is a lot of fun too when it is this warm. Nice thing though is that there is a pool and it is a great way to cool off after working up a sweat trying to knock out some DIY stuff around here.

Turned the front sprinklers to run every morning super early to just keep the front yard from turning to crisp...the backyard is still a struggle to deal with but trying to take things one day at a time...LOL.

Wildfires seem to be the big news items right now...if we could get a few days of rain thrown in with this sunshine, it would definitely calm things down a bit.
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One Year Ago on In My Words...Bad Blogger, I Know...funny, same thing this year too...must just be this time of year for it...LOL

Smart Tube Technology

Image from Clorox.com

Oh my gosh...this has been something we have needed for ages. I never could figure out why all the spray bottle companies had not figured this out a long time ago. I would get lucky sometimes and be able to turn the tube to lean towards the front of a bottle but it was always hit or miss if that was an option or not.

I know it probably seems silly to be excited about this...but it really is such an awesome thing. I have to wonder if someone didn't come up with this idea and then sold it to spray bottle manufacturers. Regardless, good news for those of us trying to save money and not wanting to waste!
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Seven Years Ago on In My Words...Mouse In The House