- Ever heard of a car called the MR2 Spyder? I hadn’t. It was made by Toyota from 1984-2007 (2005 in the US)– how did I miss this? (Oh that’s right – I drive Hondas) MR2 comes from mid-engine (in the rear like a VW), rear wheel drive, 2 door or “Midship Runabout 2-seater”. It is considered one of the most dangerous cars in the world, for reasons that I read here but didn’t understand. Who cares? I do, because one of my former drawing students just bought one of these hot-looking little sports cars.
- Fire teams travel with a copy trailer; that’s how they get those giant maps printed every single day for reporting to the public.
- Libby is an app available through the library- I tried this so I could read from the phone. While it works, not many books on my To-Be-Read list are available in this format and even fewer as audio books, and I prefer real books made out of paper. I resorted to this because the library in Three Rivers closed again, this time because of smoke.
- There is an exodus from California, more than 182,000 leaving in 2020. I have lost drawing students to Oregon, Nevada, Wyoming, and Wisconsin and know other folks who have gone to Texas, Idaho, and Arizona. This emigration (could it be called “right flight”?) has made it is very difficult to find moving companies or U-Haul vehicles.
- Air Quality Index is determined by people living in the area. There are monitors set around the community and the information is updated regularly, maybe even automatically. For example, in Three Rivers, there are 10 addresses listed; they get averaged together, and I can see the specific reading that is closest to my house.
- Firefighting is not all that it appears to be. This disturbing opinion piece by a longtime firefighter shows a side to our fires that some may have suspected, but had nothing to go on. Adversarial Front Line is an opinion piece published in an independent Truckee newspaper called Moonshine Ink.
- After a big wildfire followed by a rainstorm, the river turns black!
- Contentment is a beautiful state. A friend sent us a generous gift card as a thank you, which Trail Guy handed to me with the instructions to “Get something special”. I recently bought daffodil bulbs and some shrubs to plant (bug off, deer!) and some yarn (oh just hush up), and I truly want nothing. (Well, I could use more time for gardening and knitting but money can’t buy that.)
- A good question to ask yourself if you are decluttering is: “Would I buy this again?” If the answer is no, GONE!
- A set of unusual circumstances gave me the opportunity to spend several evenings with some friends. While there, I learned that playing Jeopardy is fun, especially when you have a Pause button on your teevee. People have to know a ton to get on that show; a recent winning streak was about 35 games, with the guy seeming to know everything. Then suddenly he had an off night where he folded like a cheap card table. He couldn’t hear us shouting answers at him, and it was a mystery. My friends excel in popular music and in math; I did well in Ireland and Bible. We all were able to come up with surprising random answers, but it usually took us several minutes of discussing. I have no idea how the contestants can know so much and think so quickly, but I learned that Jeopardy can be fun.