For the first time in over a week, I went outside and it did not smell like smoke

[KitchenWitch]

We went trick or treating for about an hour and a half...air quality is improving quite a bit here.

[Ptah]

1. That's good news.

:applause:

[KitchenWitch]

3. It is!

That picture looks like an area near my house...with all the heavy equipment.

The Irvine Company is getting ready to develop another patch of what used to be farmland.

x(

But it is good to see you here tonight.

:)

[SeattleGirl]

2. Glad to hear that, Kitchey.

Gotta be a BIG relief!

[KitchenWitch]

4. Sure is.

Days on end, I could not go outside without my eyes burning, and my lungs gasping for air.

Vigilante justice would be way too good for the waste of human parts that set the damn fire.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

5. I am soooooooo glad to hear this, my dear KW!

Oh....

Wanted to tell you...

Khash called me last night...

He should very soon be in possession of DSL...

And be returning to us!

I am hoping!

I'm really happy to hear that your air quality is much better now... :pals:

[KitchenWitch]

7. I look forward to seeing him soon!

:)

:hug:

[Haole Girl]

6. Good news!

:hi:

[KitchenWitch]

8. It really is.

How is my neighbor doing?

:hi:

[Haole Girl]

9. She's fine...

Thanks! :hi:

[SPKrazy]

10. good

that you have air again

although it isn't real air, it is just not smoke filled air

:P

[Oeditpus Rex]

11. That OC 'Shoot the Smokers' policy is workin', huh?

:P

[KitchenWitch]

12. yah, but I wish our college aged neighbors would not throw their empty ciggy packs on my lawn.

[begin_within]

13. Thank heavens. Last week was miserable. But they are saying this weekend will be

a mild "Santa Ana" condition - not as strong as the winds during the first couple days of the fires, but otherwise the same conditions.

[KitchenWitch]

14. I could go for some milder Santa Ana winds, without the fire this time.

:hi:

Glad you made it okay too.

[begin_within]

15. I don't know if you were here 4 years ago, but what happened is this:

After the Cedar Fire of October 2003 (which was 280,000 acres and burned 2,232 homes and killed 15 people), the weather was quiet for a copule of weeks, just like it is now. But in mid-November the Santa Ana winds returned. There were no fires that time, but the winds whipped up an enormous amount of dust and ash, that was left over from the Cedar Fire. People walked out of their homes and saw the brown skies on the horizon and thought, "Where's the fire?" but it was only dust being blown around, from soil that had been made bare by the fire two weeks earlier. It didn't smell as bad as the smoke, but the dust was still irritating. It went away as soon as the winds stopped. Everything was fine until the winter the following year (2004-5) which was one of the rainiest winters we've ever had. I did not turn on the garden hose even one time between October 2004 and April 2005. There was so much rain so consistently that I did not have to water anything. Which was a great blessing. However, those rains triggered a lot of landslides, mostly small ones but a few big ones including a landslide at La Conchita, CA, which killed 10 people, and a mudslide up in the San Bernardino National Forest that killed some people at a church camp. So the hope is that we will get a lot of small, gentle rains, which will allow the burned areas to regrow steadily, instead of big drenches which will cause mudslides and landslides.