Fortunately I'm not looking out my window and seeing what those poor folks in San Diego County are seeing. Hang in there, Poolie, we're all keeping our fingers crossed for you and everyone else in the area.I've had Fox News on for the last several days following the developments of the fires, and I've heard some extremely interesting comments from some of the reporters. One, who was reporting from the Malibu area where all the movie stars and famous people live, stated that he hoped that many of the stars who are such strong environmentalists, would rethink their philosophies now on clearing out the brush, etc. to prevent these fires in the future. Isn't it just a tad more important to save people's lives and homes than to preserve the homes of the little creatures that frequent the woods surrounding their homes. After all, they've got the entire remainder of the state of California to live in.
One reporter, who was reporting on how the state and local governments are stepping up to the plate stated that it's amazing how many positive things can be accomplished when the governor and the mayors of the cities/towns cooperate - referring of course to Mayor Nagan of New Orleans and the governor of Louisiana. Their most important issue was to blame someone else and not take any responsibility for anything. Where in California, in my opinion, it's not who is at fault, but what can we do to improve the situation and accomplish what we need to do. What a difference.
We've had the occasional grass fire in our area, usually started by a cigarette being thrown out the window or a spark flying from a train. And with the wind that we get here in the open prairies of Minnesota, the fire can move pretty fast. All ditches in the area are kept mowed pretty short though, so even if the grass does catch on fire the flames don't leap hundreds of feet into the air like they do when trees are burning. Up in our area the only natural catastrophes we deal with are floods, blizzards and tornadoes.
Maybe you all remember hearing about the Flood of '97, when the Red River of the North was 60 miles wide in spots, inundated many cities, and the City of Grand Forks, ND nearly burned to the ground when it was under water. Our property runs along the Buffalo River, which is a tributary of the Red, and we were flooded quite badly that year. This took place the last week of March, and when the water level was at its peak we had a blizzard that dropped 7" of snow on top of all the frozen water. We were so fortunate that the water didn't get into our house, but it was several feet deep both in our storage building and in Ole's shop. Believe me, that was a mess to clean out. But at least we had something to clean - not like the folks who have had everything they own end up in a pile of rubble on the ground.
We're thankful.
