I just finished a batch of 18+ jars of marmalade. In the past I posted live updates of marmalade making, but this year it's just the final results. I wasn't able to get enough Seville oranges this year, so I added some Olinda (heirloom Valencia) oranges and some Meyer lemon juice. It still tastes great, though less fragrant than the absolute best pure Seville marmalade I've made in the past.
Equally jarring were places where an intact, gaudily lit house sat next to a cleared lot. The devastation of the fire was shockingly random. A house at the very top of the neighborhood, right next to the wild area that burned, was completely untouched and had its usual exuberant light show, while the lot next door was empty with a star out front.
#EatonFire
The neighborhood kept the traditional light up, but they acknowledged that more than 80 homes were destroyed by the fire. The neighborhood association that organizes the lights every year put stars in front of the empty lots where destroyed houses used to be. Walking down a nighttime street past empty lot after empty lot, seeing the stars there to remind you of what was there the previous Christmas, was deeply eerie.
#EatonFire
My neighborhood (Upper Hastings Ranch in Pasadena) hosts a big Christmas light event every year. Unlike many neighborhoods, this one is largely cooperative rather than competitive. Each block has a theme, with every house on the block having a matching street side decoration. Houses are free to have additional decorations, but they try very hard to get every house to participate.
Today is the one year anniversary of the #EatonFire. I was lucky and didn't suffer anything more than some inconvenience, but I still think about it several times a week. I can't even imagine how bad it is for people whose homes and whole neighborhoods were destroyed.
I had a similar experience returning to my own office after evacuating for the fire. It was full of reminders of the things we had been planning before getting blind sided by the fires. With my own office it was maybe even more jarring, both because it was my office rather than someone else's and because it was just a few days rather than a year or so. It really gave me the feeling that reality had skipped the tracks and dumped me in a parallel universe. /Digression3
The office white board was covered with the planned dates of vacations never taken and conferences never attended. Seeing all that stuff felt like stepping into a parallel universe where the pandemic never happened. /Digression2
(Digression)
I think that weird disconnect is something many of us experienced associated with the COVID shutdown. The one I remember most distinctly was visiting the secretaries' office at work. We were told the shutdown would only be for a couple of weeks, but they stayed remote-only indefinitely. When someone unlocked their office like a year later, it was a literal time capsule of the before times. /Digression1
The most disturbing part would come when I spotted a landmark again. My sense of where I was would suddenly be confirmed again, but with it came the realization that all the things I missed in the middle were well and truly gone for good.
This was all happening subconsciously, of course. My conscious mind knew about the damage, but that's very different from seeing it firsthand.
/5
#EatonFire
I would go for some distance through one of the less damaged areas, and my navigation would work fine. The damaged and destroyed buildings were distressing, but my sense of place was still intact. When I got to areas where there was very little left, I got a jarring loss of connection. My dead reckoning sense told me I was in one place, but the landmarks I expected were all gone. /4
#EatonFire
I've heard it said that some people navigate by looking for landmarks and other people use dead reckoning, but I use a mix of the two. I have a good idea of where I am from dead reckoning, but I double check by looking for landmarks I expect to see. This is largely subconscious when I know an area well.
In Altadena, it didn't work as expected. /3
#EatonFire
I mean that point about being disoriented both in the common meaning of feeling like my brain was having trouble keeping up with reality that was somehow knocked askew, and in the very literal sense that I was having difficulty orienting myself. /2
#EatonFire
I drove through Altadena over the weekend, which was my first time there since the #EatonFire. It's hard to describe the experience in a few words. I never lived there, but I have visited often, both to see a friend who lived there and just passing through on long walks.
I expected to feel sad for the destruction of places I knew, especially my friend's house, and I did feel that way. Mostly, though, I felt *disoriented*. /1
This article about the problems caused by a "ghost kitchen" moving into a residential neighborhood show how awful the techbro economy is. The business located in a residential neighborhood by claiming to be a catering service. Because the delivery drivers are allegedly independent contractors, the business can claim not to be at fault for their misbehavior.
This article from Stat News on the danger of raw meat pet foods is alarming. Not only have raw pet foods killed pets by serving as a source of H1N5 bird flu, they risk spreading the infection to the pets' human companions and from there into the broader population.
I'm evacuating from the #eatonfire, which has blown up quickly. It hadn't even started when I got home from work, but I had to evacuate before bedtime. It's a good reminder to have a plan for what to do in an emergency.
We just got the all clear. The #NRA can still go to hell.
I'm currently sheltering in place at work because of the threat of a gunman. The #NRA can go to hell.