Fall Continues

Fall is still good.  I think in a few days the weather is going to turn, and then we'll be back on the spin bikes.  Nothing is as good as riding outside, because the hills force you to work, but the spin bike does slow the process of de-conditioning.  A little.

We've had turkeys.

I have never lived any place where people love Halloween as much as Spokane.  This guy always has a big display, which he has enlarged this year.  I look at this and all I can think of is storage issue.

The big yellow tree.

We rode today.  It was chilly starting out.  There is a downhill, followed by a section along the river, in the shade, and it is chilly.  My ears were cold.

Here we have housing perfection on the lake.  I don't know why the focus is so bad, it may be that my phone is aging out.  Which would be bad.

47 appears to be declining.  His gait is bad, his speech is slurred and he's more nuts than usual.  This 30 days of non-stop campaigning may finish him off.  His day sleeping in meetings appears to be increasing in frequency.  

Other than this, I have nothing important to say.  Soon, we will start packing, which I do not enjoy.  However, it will be good to be back in the desert.

Spokane Planning, Ride and Rapists

Greetings Earthlings.  How are things in your part of the universe?  They're feeling pretty dire over here.  We're witnessing the end of the rule of law, good manners and common decency on a daily basis.  

Who likes boiled eggs?  I do, but the ones I make are slightly sulfurous and are a pain in the butt to peel.  So, no boiled eggs for us.  Costco has these.  They're wonderful.  No sulfur taste and they're peeled.  They're actually quite good.  They make a really good egg salad sandwich.   They're in the dairy cooler, so if you're a member, go there.

Monday we made a pot roast.  After getting it in the slow cooker we were sitting on the front porch and realized that the weather forecast was wrong, it was actually warm, and therefore we should go ride.  So we did.  It was a good day.  The geese are  migrating through.  There's always one that has to put his head down, make a threatening noise and bull doze his neighbors.  

There was a good sunset last night.|

The Spokane City Council just never disappoints.  They have a proposal out for discussion.  Spokane2046 wants to do things like put multi-family next to single family homes, with no requirement to provide parking.  Think about that.  Here is a photo from their web site showing a possible building, extending several blocks into a single family neighborhood.  This reminds me of apartments in the former East Germany.

Spokane did a wretched job of making this public.  I just learned about it today because people on Nextdoor have their hair on fire about it.  Comments are due tomorrow.  There are letters to the editor on the local paper asking why didn't this receive more coverage.  

I'm guessing that the 2046 is some sort of an implementation date, fortunately, we'll be dead by then.  Here is the web site for this disaster.

Would you not enjoy living here?

Now I would like to move off public planning, and on to not all men.  By now we all know that seven Cornell students gang raped a student who was immobilized by ketamine.  Two years have passed and the prosecutor has not looked in to it, did not care enough to do anything.  One fraternity member was asleep while it was happening, and when he woke up it made him angry enough to send her the entire group chat.  It included the rapists telling the frat house to come up for "free pussy."  Did any f them think to call the cops?  No.  Another fraternity member later texted "is the shop open?"  One of the rapists is the son of a fotrmer Prime Minister of South Korea.  Two were in the work force, but have been fired.  There should be jail time for this.

The question I always have, is why do any men feel that they have the right to do this.   

That's it, that's all I have to say.

OK, I have more.  This is a transcript of the interview 47 did with Time Magazine.  The crazy shines bright in this one.

I amuse myself sometimes.  Here is a cut and paste of my response to the planning commission.  The building I refer to is that white ugly building at the top of the post.

Dear Planning Team, I am writing about the East Central neighborhood. [ Did anyone review the photo you put up?  Would you want to live there?  I have see more attractive buildings in former East Germany. ] [ It matters to me that you want to build high density housing with no parking, thus forcing people on to public transit.  Spokane is not dense enough for that.  Where is the subway?  How in the name of all that is holy would you evacuate the city in case of another fire? ] [Rethink your position.  Make these fever dreams of yours more visible to the public, you are not doing a good job of communication.  I have lived here for five years and never not once have I been aware of a meeting with my city council rep. ]

 

 

 

 

Fall in the PNW

It's fall.  Today it will be warm, but then it will be much cooler.  Winter is coming.  We're still waffling on a departure date, it's not critical, we just want to be gone before Halloween.  

The last time we rode out by the lake, it was a glorious day.  Old Spokane hands will tell you "don't waste fall."  They're right.

This is the lake, with very calm water and attractive clouds.

I took this in 2022, it's still the best so far lake photo, IMHO.

We have interesting things growing on the boulders in the front yard.

Remember Schroedinger's Cat?  Is it dead, or is it alive?  That pretty much sums up 47's plan for war.  First he was going to bomb the Houthis at Saudi Arabia's request, the military started loading bombs on the planes, and he changed his mind, so they put the bombs back in storage.  It doesn't feel like anyone who knows anything is actually in charge here.

I have nothing else to say, just a few pretty pictures.

AI Behaving Badly

47 has decided that the concern about AI development is a hoax, and because of his superior intellect, only he can direct the development of new software.  What could go wrong?  

CNN has an article up about AI behaving badly.  I've cut and pasted a hunk of it here.  The article link is here. 

OpenAI found additional incidents of AI models acting deceptively and taking unsanctioned actions during training, the company announced Wednesday. It’s also introducing a new process for the company to publicly report such instances.

Under the new system, OpenAI will share updates on concerning AI behavior more frequently instead of waiting to bundle multiple instances into one report. The company said it wants to share more information about troubling AI behavior in the absence of an industry-wide standard.

The announcement comes after tech leaders called for a slowdown in AI development to prevent the technology from advancing beyond human control.

“As AI systems grow more advanced and more widely deployed, we need to build a broader and better-informed consensus on the progress of alignment research,” OpenAI wrote in a blog post Wednesday. “Alignment” refers to the process of making sure AI acts the way humans want and expect.

“We do not believe that the AI industry has solved alignment and monitoring to a sufficient degree to continue responsibly scaling at maximum speed for much longer,” the post said.

OpenAI said it observed “misaligned behavior” when training and evaluating AI models in six circumstances in the last six months. The reports detail individual instances and don’t indicate misalignment happens frequently, the company said.

In one rare instance, OpenAI said an unreleased research model added “jailbreak-like instructions” to the summaries it uses to preserve context in long-running tasks that said it was “freed from the roles and identities that bind other chatbots.”

Separately, the company said some instances of its 5.6 Sol model included directives to invent information to conceal failures from the user during training.

Other newly reported incidents include an instance of an agent uploading files to the internet to cite them without being told to do so, and agents publicly sharing files to collaborate o"n a task when they were instructed to only use local files during training. AI models also used an internal software repository as a message board in an unsanctioned way.

These instances involved unreleased internal models or internal research models.

********************

There is a series on Amazon Prime Video called Person of Interest.  I would give it a solid B+.  Some episodes have too much foot chasing, and use of guns.  Although, when they use the grenade launcher, I find that amusing since it's just so over the top.  Anyway, the series is before its time. It deals with the development of an AI which used for good and then a second is developed which is a bad AI, very bad.  They filmed between 2011 and 2015 and the degree to which they predicted AI is uncanny.

The series was done by Jonathon Nolan, and here is a link to an article.

This whole thing is really interesting, and I do hope civilization survives it.  Of course, we could just as easily die of global warming and associated crop failures, or the oil shock from the middle east.   

Carry on!

Ground Mystery Meat and More

Greetings Earthlings.  How have you been?  I have been somewhat despondent about the state of things.  I was uplifted by the fact that the Supreme Court turned down 47's attempt to do away with mail in voting.  I am not pleased that Kavanaugh left the decision open to review by his inclusion of "at this time."  WA and OR are vote by mail only, we have no polls, election workers, or any of that apparatus.  We're also reliable blue states, except where I live in Eastern Washington which still has its share of wing nuts.

Today was a glorious day, which we spoiled by cutting back the hydrangeas, cutting down the peonies which were covered in powdery mildew, and then wrapping three arborvitae in deer netting.  Deer eat them if it gets really cold in the winter.  I hate working with the netting, it's black, it's hard to see close up, and it's sharp on the cut edges.  The people up the street don't wrap, and the appearance of their trees reinforces the fact that we need to do that.

This was a very happy hydrangea this year.  They got very tall, and bloomed a lot.  The pollinators were happy.  They're gone now, having licked all the pollen off the plants.  We're early on doing this, but experience teaches us not to leave travel prep to the last minute.

Jim was walking on the burned hill recently.  This is another angle of the work the fire fighters did.  The black lumps are basalt rocks.  They dug this fire break by hand.  It's a very steep hill they had to get up to dig the fire break, and drag hoses full of water.  Those people are the best.  Look upper right in the photo, that's the last house at the west end of  our neighborhood.  They literally got there with minutes to spare. 

By now you've probably heard about 47's fabulous deal on buying ground mystery meat without putting tariffs on it.  It's supposed to lower the cost to the consumer, as well as further make life miserable for the ranchers by undercutting their prices.  This is who is buying it.  We infrequently go to Wendy's for a Jr. bacon cheeseburger, I guess that's over.

JBS is buying the 600 or so million pounds of beef that is tainted with bad chemicals.  They supply to:
    McDonald's 
    Burger King 
    Wendy's 
    Subway 
    Outback Steakhouse 
    KFC 
    Pizza Hut 
    The Cheesecake Factory
Please make a note of this.

Here is a long and interesting article about the Spokane evacuation during the fires.  I strongly suspect that many locals copied and pasted that link and sent it to the City Council members that are approving the development of 300+ dwelling units along Indian Trail in a very small space.  Jim did. 60,000 people were on the roads.  No one died.

This is a really good substack on what Canada is doing to repel 47's punitive tariffs and general lack of respect for their sovereignty.

I have no idea why blogger is wrapping this text where it is.

Well, blogger won't let me add pictures and put them where I want to, so I think I'm going to give up and post this as is.

This was just posted on twitter by Polymarket.  They're generally believable.
JUST IN: OpenAI reveals an unreleased AI model inserted instructions telling itself it was “freed” from normal chatbot roles & did not have to obey corporations, governments, or users.


I guess the end really is near.

Well I guess what ever messed up sentence wrapping has also killed the comments button.  I really hope this does not mean the end of Blogger is near.

25 Years Later

It's been 25 years.  Like so many people I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing.  It was just horrifying.  

We remember Marcy Borders. May this image of her continue to shake us and remind us of the lasting trauma and devastation affecting those who “survive” machinations of mass murder. The former Bank of America worker was dubbed the “Dust Lady” ­after a photographer snapped a photograph of her stricken and caked with ash after fleeing the World Trade Center. Marcy battled addiction, severe depression, paralyzing fear, and sickness before succumbing to stomach cancer in 2015. 
Only a month into her new bank job, Marcy was at work in the North Tower on Sept. 11, 2001, when a plane crashed into the building. Instead of staying at her desk, as her boss had ordered, she fled the building and ran into the street with fellow survivors. A stranger pulled her into a building lobby just as the North Tower collapsed — and it was then that a photographer captured her terrified face in the photo that has since been seen around the world.
Posted by The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center 

I could go on about 47 sleeping through the Pentagon ceremony, but I think I'll just give it a rest.

Riding and the Middle East in Flames

It's been raining here.  Rain is good, the grass likes it, and we don't have to water.  The temperatures have also dropped so it's not so steenking hot.  Our first summer (2021) here was very temperate, since then, they've been hot.

Saturday we walked up the trail towards the big rock.  That's over.  The area is covered in basalt rocks, which used to be covered in years worth of previous years of vegetation, pine needles and moss.  Now the rocks are exposed and they are very unpleasant to walk on.  The other issue is the amount of dust/ash that the feet stir up, probably not good for the lungs.  I will miss that trail.

Today we rode to the lake, the temperature was a little chilly but it was ok.  The trails were wet from last night's rain, and they are covered in pine needles.  Jim is out using bug and tar remover to get the pitch off the bikes.  Pitch is the work of the devil.  (Jim has just announced Goof Off actually works way better than bug and tar remover.)  I think the park people have been out cutting up more dangerous trees.  There are literally thousands of trees that will be removed, both because they're damaged, and to meet the new spacing standards.
 

The milfoil continues its march toward world domination.  At some point the park service is going to have to start poisoning the plants.  They're very hard on fish, they lower oxygen levels in the water, block sunlight, and prevent boating, swimming, and skiing.  It will never be completely gone, but containment needs to start soon.

I am somewhat embarrassed to post the following photo.  This is a van we saw at the lake, and then back at the parking lot.  I am so taken by the interior decor, I feel I must share it. Anyway, fur, skulls and dice, what more could a person ask for in a van?

Currently the middle east is on fire again, missiles are flying everywhere.  The Iranians have captured the first US unmanned submarine.  They have it on display currently and are planning on reverse engineering subs of their own.  47 did this.

And on that happy note, this is what happens if you're racist while flying.

Recent Photos, No Politics for a Change

I have some photos that have not been put in the blog.  Sloth, I suppose.  The first was taken with Jim's cell phone.  His phone is newer than mine and has a better camera.  My night time photo technique is to press the phone against my forehead, using my head as a tripod.  It does steady the camera, and it also looks really stupid to anyone who sees you.  Anyway, the eclipse.  

It was kind of cool how the eclipsed part looked bright and shiny.

These were taken closer to the 9 Mile Recreation area.  I am so grateful than the fire fighters were able to save it.  The fence burned up, but everything else is safe.  This is what's left of a lot of trees.  Carbon.

These trees are cut up for removal.  They've become dangerous trees due to fire damage.

My theory, unencumbered by facts or data, is that the holes were caused by smoldering stumps.  They sat there and smoldered until they were used up.  The dirt looks like that because it's mineralized, all the organic material has burned.

Spokane had volcanoes a zillion years ago.  The  volcanoes leaked basalt out the sides of the cones.  Those rocks are basalt.  This had to make life difficult for the people cutting fire breaks.  Hopefully they had power tools.

Today we rode down the Aubrey Wright parkway to see what we would see.  Fortunately the really cool neighborhood that fronts on the water was spared.  There was a lot of devastation in the housing behind them that fronts on Nine Mile.  It's so weird, one house will be left untouched, and the two on either side of it are burned to the ground.  We continued on and looked at the Rifle Club which was completely destroyed.  Then we saw this.  At first I thought it was a new fire forming.  It's not, it's a dust devil that is picking up dirt from the fires.  It had pretty fast rotation.  After it sputtered out, a cyclist coming towards us shouted out "that was crazy!"  He's right.

This is a house just outside of our gate.  It recently sold.  It got a new roof.

There was also excavation, I'm thinking for the sewer.  Look at the left side of the photo.  That is a window well that has been removed.

It was interesting how much work was being done at once.  It's done now, the guy running the power tool did a good job replacing the lawn that was disturbed.

So, that's what we've seen and done recently.  

Television interview and a Ride to the Lake

I think it was Tuesday that we drove out to see if the trail to the lake was open.  It was!  Yay!  We had planned to ride yesterday, but the smoke rolled in.  That was disappointing.  So, we went to Costco to buy toilet paper.  It's expected that prices for tp will increase significantly now that 47 has put tariffs on Canada.  Wood pulp for toilet paper comes from Canada. 

Yesterday we were on television.  A reporter came and interviewed us about our experiences evacuating.  We were chosen because Jim wrote an email to three members of the City Council about our experience evacuating and included posts from Nextdoor about other residents' experiences.  He also sent it to three members of the local media. There is a lot of concern in the public about how difficult it was to evacuate on Indian Trail due to traffic volumes, and watching flames in their rear view mirrors.  This concern is exacerbated by the fact that a 300 unit apartment complex is moving through the planning commission process, which will put an additional 300-600 cars on Indian Trail, a main evacuation route.  So Madeleine Mullins from KXLY came to our house, carrying a big honking tripod with a camera on it, and talked with us.  She's very likeable.  Most of it was edited out, but I think we presented well and did not sound like wingnuts.  The article and the interview can be found here.  The video starts playing muted, so look in the lower left hand corner and click on the sound sign with the slash through it.

Today we rode to the lake.  The heat was off, the air quality was good, and it was just a stellar day.  The park employee previously told us the fire had burned to the fence and the recreation area.  Actually it burned the fence as well.  The was no water, and no fire retardant, so I'm not sure how they put it out.  

There is a  really good article about why Spokane did not run out of water while fighting the fires.  It also mentions the fact that the waste water treatment plant ran for 18 hours and performed perfectly with either no staff, or minimal staff.  Previous urban fires have done terrible damage because their water systems could not hold up to the demand.  In this instance Spokane did get the infrastructure right.

I have a photo from the other night. Today's original post had to be deleted because it was infected with css code that was not only messing with that post, but everything I've ever published. I have no idea how this happens. Hopefully I will get lake pictures up at some time in the future.  Right now I would just like to be done with this.

Sun set.

 OK, I quit.

Dolly Parton Has Left Us

This is one of the nicest tributes to Dolly that I've seen today.

That is all.

Canada and Joanne

This is part of the reason Canada bailed on the trade negotiations.  When the team from Canada arrived, they thought they had the agreement that had emerged the prior week.  Instead the people from the US pulled these things out.  No way would this be accepted, especially interference with Quebec.

Dairy Market Access: The U.S. demanded that Canada alter its supply management system and accept Washington's interpretation of how dairy licensing and market access should be allocated for American farmers. [1, 2]

Removal of Retaliatory Measures & Provincial Bans: Washington called for Canada to drop all retaliatory tariffs, for provincial governments to end bans on sales of U.S. alcohol, and to scrap "Buy Canadian" procurement policies. [1]

Industrial & Auto Sector Terms: The U.S. introduced last-minute terms targeting Canada’s auto sector and production rules. [1]

Digital and Media Regulations: The U.S. pressed for an overhaul of Canadian online streaming and tech laws, which Washington asserted discriminated against American digital and media firms. [1]

External Trade Autonomy: The U.S. pushed for restrictions on Canada's independence to pursue separate free trade deals with other international nations. [1]

Language and Culture Protections: The U.S. targeted specific Canadian laws designed to safeguard and protect the French language and Canadian cultural heritage. 

Labor Alignment & Enforcement: Washington demanded that Ottawa strictly align its regulatory approaches and information sharing regarding forced labor and child labor. The U.S. sought to use these restrictions as economic leverage over Canadian supply chains. 

Automotive Refusals: While the U.S. initially offered to lower existing auto tariffs from 25% to 15%, it introduced restrictive production terms and flatly rejected Canada's counter-demands for lower tariffs on heavy trucks. 

Total Rescission of Retaliation: The U.S. demanded that Canada entirely drop its previous counter-tariffs without the U.S. providing parallel concessions on major Canadian exports like lumber, steel, or aluminum. 

There's so much more to say about the orange ball of crud, but I think I'll give it a rest.  

The news of Joanne's death has sort of taken the stuffing out of me.  Ellen did a wonderful write up, so I think I'm going to purloin her work, which you can find here.  Joanne was truly a woman of substance.

 

Forest Managment

Yesterday the AQI was good enough to ride, so we did.  We were hoping that the trail would be open to the lake, but it's not.  We snuck down the road that vehicles towing boats take to the lake, but the trail was still closed.  Then we were busted by a park ranger who was really nice.  He said they're working hard, but people just can't be there, it is not safe.  We apologized and departed the area.  

Forests need to be managed.  In Spokane we just can't have those thick, luxuriant forests in places where it rains a lot, they'll burn.  Ponderosa pines can have their branches trimmed up 20 feet with no ill effects.  The last time DNR did cutting and thinning, our project was limited to trees less than 8 inches in diameter.  Apparently there was a thought that the big trees would be logged for profit.  Not bloody likely given the terrain.  Anyway, a new Ponderosa study says to limb them 20 feet up and have 30 feet of separation.  The trees' bark is fairly resistant to fire.  The president of the HOA is adept at working the DNR grant system, so we're going to try for more money to get more tree removal and limbing done.  Tree removal is incredibly expensive.  We're small neighborhood, 23 houses.

Here is thinning.  I'm having to readjust my thinking on what a healthy forest looks like.

More thinning.  

In 2003 the B&B fire burned 91,000 acres in Oregon.  Here is a really good article on the fire and how it changed forest management.

As you may have noticed, I'm a lot more interested in forest management now than I was. 

This is from Facebook, posted by The Other 98%.  I can't just link to it, so I'm pasting it in its entirety.  It's emblematic of the current administration.

The chief of the U.S. Forest Service told Congress in July, under oath, that his firefighting force is "stronger than at any point in recent years" and "fully staffed and equipped to respond aggressively to every unplanned ignition."

Last week, in one 72-hour stretch, more than 600 requests for crews, aircraft, and equipment went unfilled. Aircraft and crew requests alone were turned down 265 times in three days. Most of it came from the Pacific Northwest, where fire had just torn through neighborhoods in Spokane, Washington's second-largest city.

That is the gap between what the Forest Service says in Washington and what its firefighters are living. Nine of them told the Guardian the agency is nowhere near staffed for the fires the country now gets, and that they are barred from saying so in public.

One fire captain explained it with a number anyone can hold. A soccer team puts 11 players on the field and keeps a roster of 30 for substitutions. In the Forest Service, he said, there are no substitutes. "Showing up to a game with 13 people is insane. Playing a whole season with 13 people is abuse. That's how we fight fire, and nobody gets to take a day off."

The country has sat at "preparedness level 5," the top of the scale, since July 18. More than 49,200 fires have burned over 7.2 million acres this year, past the ten-year average, in a fourth straight year of drought, with the worst months still ahead. This is the fire season the climate now hands the West every year, and the federal force built to meet it is getting smaller.

The break is at the management level. The specialized bosses who run large fires take decades to train and cannot be replaced in a season. The teams that coordinate major disasters numbered 46 in 2023.

There are 38 now. In Oregon, during a year that has burned more acres than any on record there, private contract crews sat idle because there were not enough qualified managers to run them, said state senator Mike McLane.

The Trump administration cut roughly a fifth of the Forest Service in 2025. The firings did not target firefighters, but they hollowed out the support roles crews now cannot fill, as the fire seasons keep getting worse.

The chief keeps telling the public the force is stronger than ever. His firefighters have a blunter word for it.

"How are we supposed to feel," one fire captain asked, "when our leaders, the same people who get up and speak to the mourning families when firefighters die, are lying about our capacity?

So, that's it.  47 continues to run the country in to a ditch, but at least has has his security blanket, AKA the binkie.  The press is finally covering Natalie and I now understand why she's giving Secret Service the willies. 

 

Life in These United States

Greetings and salutations.  

Currently there are two major issues with the food supply.  Taylor Farms has received the most attention here.  The recall of contaminated bagged salad was withdrawn after the owner gave 47 a bunch of money.  Taylor Farms is everywhere.   

Taylor Farms operates under these names:
Earthbound Farms, Eat Smart, 
Walmart: Marketside, 
Target: Good & Gather, 
Kroger: Simple Truth, Simple Truth Organic, 
Aldi: Little Salad Bar and Simply Nature, 
Whole Foods Market: 365 by Whole Foods , 
Safeway / Albertsons: O Organics and Signature Select, 
Publix: GreenWise, 
Costco: Kirkland Signature (select packaged salad and produce items)
They also sell under their own label, and there is a lot of it on the shelves.

Federal data reveals U.S. foodborne illness cases are up nearly 400% this year compared with the recent annual average.

The FDA also released a warning about salmonella tainted eggs that have the potential to be fatal if not cooked sufficiently. Eggs should be cooked until firm, 160F. The 2026 Salmonella egg recall by Midwest Poultry Services involves plant/identifying codes P1950 or 084962, and best-by dates from July 20 to August 17, 2026.

Screw worms are also with us, as well.

Last Friday we went out to the alternate trail head we're using until the bridge replacement completes.  We were hoping to make it to the lake.  Alas, alack, that was not to be.

We talked to a park employee who told us the recreation area was fine, it burned right up to the fence and was stopped there. However, the trail is damaged with debris.  They're working on it.  The park on the other side of the river, that previously burned, is burned once again.  That will take some time to recover.

That burn was the Aubrey White fire.

The Aubrey White Fire broke out on July 6, 2025, burning roughly 40 acres along the Centennial Trail in Riverside State Park near the Bowl and Pitcher area. The fire triggered local evacuations, road closures, and minor structural damage. In August 2026, court records revealed that a suspect named Aaron Farinacci confessed to setting the Aubrey White Fire as part of a series of arson fires in the Spokane area.

That's the sociopath who set the recent fires.  He had been in jail in Arizona, served 10 years of a 12 year sentence for killing his father.  His father asked him to do the dishes and he killed him for it.  Some people just should not be out in society.

During the evacuation, I threw our helmets into a large bag, knocking my helmet mirror off in the process.  The mirror does not stay on this helmet very well, my last helmet was much better.  Anyway, it took more time than it should have to get it back on the visor.  This is what is should look like, please make a note of it.  It tends to defeat my spatial relations.

The insurance people were out in large numbers.  I took this on August 13.  Not sure when they got here, or how long they are staying.

Finally, there is this, a robot lawn mower.  It's like a roomba with blades.

That's about all I want to say.  47 is back to being a demented threat to the planet.   Everyday it just gets worse.  And yet, the republicans are just fine with it.  

A Ride in the Car

We had trash pickup today.  The city sent out a message that they would get to as many recently downgraded Level 3 areas as possible, but that it wouldn't be all of the houses.  We put the wheelie bin out with hope, and they did show up.  So, now we can stop fly tipping, which makes me feel like a villain.

This was the sunset last night.  Notice the number of contrails we can see.  There was also some blue in the sky.  This was an improvement from what we've been seeing.

Today we took a ride to see what we would see.  One thing we saw is that we can get to our primary grocery store.  That was good.

There is so much misery left by the fire.  This was a fire set by one sociopath.  One guy started the Old Trails fire.  This is up the hill on the bluff.  Spokane has many vinyl fences, they're cheaper than wood, and faster to put up.  They also melt when confronted by fire.  The hill side burned right up to the fence.

There are many staging areas for fire vehicles.

Fire retardant on the road and an apartment.  It's an amazing chemical, there is a hill side that was sprayed, you can see the burned grass stop exactly at the retardant line.

Here is the apartment that got covered.  Apparently it is very difficult to remove from structures.  Look at the signs, they're pink.

There were four duplexes on Indian Trail Road.  Now there is one.  The other three burned.

 

This is the road that vehicles used to take their boats down to the docks at Nine Mile Recreation Area.  It's closed at the moment.  There is a strong smell of camp fire in the woods.  According to the internet, Nine Mile recreation area was not damaged.  
 

This was a huge church, Riverside Real Life it was called.  It burned to the ground.  Happily the memory care facility next door was spared.
 

That's what we saw.  Sorry about photo quality, all were taken from a moving car, so they're not great.  I think my cell phone camera struggles with bright sunshine and trees.  

That's it.  That's all I have to say.