Re: Redland

I'm with Ray. I wasn't thinking about the show. Shows come and go. People matter.

Fire is a real danger down here right now. I can't remember a stretch this dry. Rain? Hah! Lots of lawns are brown, including ours. Watering is limited to two mornings a week, which is really all you need. But. We are on city water, but kept the well hookup to our sprinkler system. The well went dry! Now there is water in the canal (no idea how it got there) and presumably in the well. But the pump lost its prime and we can't see a way to take the cover off and prime it. One more little chore that we don't need.

Thankfully, the ban doesn't apply to things like orchids. Our Vandaceous stuff would be DOA if it did.

Kathy, how is Joe doing?

Diana

SBOE is on the beach side - well, on a bluff above the beach. So far the fires have all been in the mountains behind the town with fingers of fire licking down arroyos and burning homes. The freeway would act as a firebreak before said fires got to the SBOE. There's a cymbidium grower that was potentially near last year's fire area. I don't think he's in danger from this one, and Gallup and Stripling and Orchids Royale are closer to Carpinteria, again miles away. Last year I went to the SBOE sale in July a day after the Goleta fires were 'contained' (there were still a few flyovers by planes). There was a very slight amount of ash on the plants, else you'd never know they had a problem at all.

Much like Australia's fires in SB the homes encroach into the foothills and along the ravines. Lets face it - Santa Barbara is a very desirable community in which to live so every nook and cranny gets inhabited. Of course the native plants are all fire tolerant and many need fire in order to survive, so the native species - while very combustible - will come back as will the people. After the Oakland Hills fire in 1990 - jeez was it that long ago? - people came back and built bigger and better. Many of the Australian eucalyptus trees were cut down and there was a push to replace them with California Natives, but I'm not sure how well that's progressed. Very few people actually sold out and moved away. Many just 'traded up', replaced their burned out old cottages for mega homes. After that fire many insurers changed the way they wrote 'full replacement cost' policies, *G*.

K Barrett

He's doing fine, as well as can be expected, hasn't quite started watching soap operas but I see him sneak peeks at Maury 'You Are The Father' Povich's worthless show. So he's bored. Thanks for asking!

Welcome. Frank has had some challenges lately. I know how it stresses out the *other*.

Diana

What's up with Frank? email me privately if you want

K Barrett