Sitting here in the mountains with all my windows open enjoying the cool breezes and watching stupid scary weather in so many places. Fires, earthquakes, blistering heat, floods. For all those experiencing Mother Nature's terrors, I wish I could send some of this lovely weather your way.

I live next to the road so I have traffic noise, which is less than serene, but I opened all the windows when I first arrived and I haven't closed them yet.

Today the air is officially unhealthy for everyone, not just the kids, old folks, and asthmatics. My apartment smells like old campfires, and my throat is burning just sitting at my computer. Today's my day off since I worked Sunday, and I was going to do errands, but I've just ordered groceries to be delivered, and I'm going to hit up Grubhut for lunch delivery. The primary smoke plume from the current big fire in the state is visible from my building, and the air quality in the canyon closest to it is at 242. Unhealthy for all people starts at 151.

The air was actually getting better, too.

Yikes, Connie. Here I am complaining about sticky weather.... ::slinks away::

Here I am complaining about sticky weather.

It's just a case of an entire state grimly repeating to itself "Winter is coming."

Mmm, food delivery. What brave new world, that has lunch delivered to your home so you don't have to get up off your ass except to answer the door. With added leftovers.

The voting discussion here reminded me that I won't be home for the Florida primary so I ordered an absentee ballot. In my 46 years of voting I have always done so in person. So a first! Honestly, I don't trust Florida to handle mail in ballots properly so I like the reassurance of seeing my friendly poll worker neighbors and watching my ballot go into the scanner. But not going to fly home just to vote in a primary, so mail-in ballot it is.

I love our mail-in ballots. Nothing(so far, knock wood) has gone awry with ours.

Connie talking about lunch inspires me--should I have mac&cheese for lunch? I've been craving it.

My front room (where the sun hits from sunrise till mid-afternoon) is blessedly cool. H called a tall and brawny neighbor to come and install the portable AC unit he had delivered yesterday, and lo, it is done. Tall neighbor also got the high, very heavy glass out of the storm door so when it's not hot enough for AC there can be a breeze, and ditto opening the catches on the sliders on the back porch, which I couldn't reach. Now we catch the nearly constant cooler breeze from the woods. There's a good chance I'll survive till October. I may not leave the house, but I'll survive.

Tall neighbor also took all the styrofoam and cardboard packing with him to recycling and trash, and my next door neighbor saw me gathering recycling this morning, "I'm going anyway, can I take yours?"

It's Be Nice to Me day!

Yes! Everyday should be Be Nice to Beverly Day!

If I weren't in Florida I might have a different feeling about ballots, but I will never forget that my county ballot gave the presidency to George Bush. What a different world we would live in if we hadn't taken that turn toward insanity.

If the Reagan attempt had succeeded.

Course, that wasn't due to ballots.

Apparently my phone number is tied into the county emergency alert system. I was sitting there reading fic when this ominous alarm started blowing up about evacuations down by the fire. Good to know I'll know about things, but for a second I wondered if the fic police were after me.