Jerome's Site

It's not terrorism. It's only the Santa Ana winds and this usually happens every year but we're already in a tizzy. Half a million people evacuated from their homes (a lot of them my friends and co-workers), hundreds of structures burned down. Some of the fires were accidental (as in downed electric poles igniting dry brush) but a few are suspected of being arson. Hope to God they catch the arsonists before they spread their destruction further. Today the wind has slowed down a bit and tomorrow should be better. My heart goes out to all those who have been rendered homeless. The conflagration could have been worse and fires could have broken out in a hundred other points. We here in Glendale are just lucky. A wind-driven fire here could obliterate the foothills. Many lives would have been lost and property damage would have gone into the tens of billions. We pray every night that we be spared from disasters, man-made and natural, because we know how devastating they can be. We should be more disaster-prepared I know. We've been kind of putting things off. Hopefully, we'll be able to put things together and make an honest to goodness disaster-preparedness plan. Last night, the basketball goal in front of our house which is at least 500 pounds was blown down and fortunately it fell onto the driveway. If it had crashed onto the roof of our garage, it would have cost a pretty sum to repair. Now, I have to wait for about 5 people to help me raise it upright so that my son can play basketball again. I'm going to put several sacks of sand on top of the base of the goal so that the wind cannot budge it next time. Our fruit trees in the backyard have been stripped bare of their leaves - only the kalamansi tree still has its leaves and quite a few ripe kalamansi ready for picking. Tomorrow I will make lemonade and wish the Santa Ana winds good riddance.