The Century Plant Is Still Holding It Together

The neighborhood Century Plant is even taller than it was before. It's looking old and battered these days, but it's still holding it together.

Random Trip To Support Joe The Plumber

Joe The Plumber needed financial backup for some truck repair, so off I went to an obscure location known as Security Park, off South Sunrise Blvd. 

I missed encountering Joe at Security Park. He managed to get his truck repaired for free, and left Security Park, so no financial support was required. Instead, we met at Costco.  Joe ate lunch and we tossed crumbs to the starlings.

Is California Doomed to Keep Burning?

I saw the headline "Is California Doomed to Keep Burning?" in The New Republic, from October, 2020 (and just as applicable this year). 

In my opinion, California will settle back down once we get some rain here. The drought of 2013-2016 killed so many trees all over California that a slow motion disaster was set into motion. Most of those dead trees would burn, and fairly-soon. There was no way to stop it. 

This year, I knew the big fires would be in the Sierra Nevada, since that mountain range hasn't burned extensively. In the years 2016-2020 many of the big fires were in the Coast Range north of San Francisco and south of the Trinity Alps, but that area can't really host big fires right now since they've been largely burned. Indeed, very few fires at all this year have started there. It's progress. 

It's a brutal process, but we're getting there.  Getting to more-sustainable thinner forests with less ground cover.

Surprise Fire

We had a surprise fire, just three blocks from my house, at the end of Larkin Way. In these photos, the fire is on opposite side of the railroad sound wall. There are lots of surprise fires these days in California, and they scare me.

Here are two photos, posted by Stephanie Duncan, on Nextdoor, Curtis Park.

A Small Fire

Jasper and I were walking near Sierra 2 Community Center in Curtis Park at our accustomed hour of 1:30 a.m. when we saw flames ahead. A homeless person had just set a fire on the little porch steps at 2424 Castro Way, at one time, the rehearsal space for Runaway Stage Productions. 

As we neared, the homeless person, wearing a grey hoodie, began to shuffle away, and head north on 24th. There’s been a woman on those steps before; perhaps it was her. Jasper and I lingered nearby. Then I used my pooper scooper to snuff out the remaining embers. From the ashes it looked like maybe a book had been set afire. 

I reported the events to Sacramento Fire Dept. I hope they responded. It’s important to stress that no one should be burning anything in California these days without professional supervision.

The Larry Elder Folks Know Intimidation Works Best

Bastards:

A Democratic candidate in the California recall election against Gov. Gavin Newsom alleges that Republican front runner Larry Elder’s security detail assaulted her and detained her against her will after she interrupted a speech Elder was giving at a Los Angeles area church on Sunday. 

Jacqueline “Jackie” McGowan, a cannabis advocate and lobbyist who is one of 46 candidates seeking to replace Gov. Newsom in a recall election, told The Sacramento Bee in an interview that several security guards “attempted to bodyslam me because I challenged (Elder) to a debate.”

Apprehensive at Target

I went shopping at the local Target this evening. I've been there many times before. Still, I felt disoriented, and a bit alarmed. 

They've been remodeling the store lately, and so every time I go there, it's different - floor tile removed here and there, more shelves, narrower aisles, products shuffled around. So, some disorientation was to be expected. Still, certain items on the shelves were understocked or nearly-absent - milk, for example. It felt like deja vu - March 2020 all over again. 

Then there was the ambient music - weird, soaring vocal synth booming through the reorganized space. And the people - a different crowd than usual. Everyone seemed dressed in black. Serious people. No joking around. 

Is this the Delta Variant at work? The Caldor Fire? The drought? The Recall Election? Afghanistan? Or some combination of all of it?

dont want to make any waves

Recall Effort Looking Shaky

The PPIC poll is the best available. It shows the recall effort will likely fail:

SACRAMENTO — Most likely California voters are opposed to the Republican-led recall effort against Gov. Gavin Newsom and a growing number fear the consequences of removing him from office with a hard-right conservative best positioned to take his place, according to new poll by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California.

The poll found that 58% of likely voters surveyed in California oppose removing Newsom from office compared to 39% who support recalling the governor, a gap rooted in the sharp partisan divide between Democratic and Republican voters in the state.

The findings, which were gathered by pollsters over a nine-day period ending on Sunday, may offer some hope for Newsom, who has for the past month expressed concern that an “enthusiasm gap” among Democratic and nonaffiliated voters could lead to his political demise — particularly with high engagement in the recall effort among Republicans.

In response, Newsom has blanketed California with ads attacking the top GOP candidates, casting them as devotees of former President Trump who oppose state mandates for COVID-19 vaccinations and mask wearing, a clear strategy to rally California’s left-leaning electorate.

...If Newsom is recalled, the candidate on the ballot who receives the most votes wins — no matter how many votes he or she receives. The crowded field of candidates is expected to splinter the electorate, which means a Republican who reels in just a small fraction of the vote could become California’s next governor. No Republican has won a statewide election in the state since 2006. 

Ballots have already been mailed to all California registered voters. The mail ballot returns so far show that more than twice as many Democrats have voted than Republicans and that liberal areas of the state such as the Bay Area have the highest rates of return, according to state officials and political data researchers.

Sacramento

I never get tired of this. Shout out to Area 4!

 

Chuck Weidman Retires

The Hydrology and Atmospheric Sciences newsletter from the University of Arizona notes that Chuck Weidman has retired. 

Ah, Chuck! I knew Chuck as a fellow graduate student at U of A, but he was also from my hometown of Corrales, NM. Chuck's father Charlie, John Shurter, Mr. Henderson, Mr. Groll, and my dad all carpooled to work at Sandia Labs. 

I was surprised to learn the Weidmans had a dog named Valdez. I once asked Chuck how the dog got its name, but he quickly changed the subject. Probably some obscure joke related to my dad.

As a graduate student, Chuck studied lightning under Professor Phillip Krider and was awarded his Ph.D. in Atmospheric Sciences in 1982. He subsequently spent his entire academic career at the University of Arizona, retiring in January 2021 after four decades of exemplary service. His innovative field experiments to study lightning in Quebec, Papua New Guinea, Brazil, and the Kennedy Space Center were truly notable. The Tropical Ocean Global Atmospheric Coupled Ocean Atmosphere Response Experiment (TOGA COARE) was a large international field experiment conducted in 1992-1993 to study the atmospheric and oceanic processes over the region of the western Pacific known as the "warm pool," a region of warm ocean and atmospheric clouds, lightning and precipitation that is linked to El Nino.

Chuck will probably be remembered most of all for his remarkable skill in the classroom. He set the gold standard when it came to teaching freshman introductory atmospheric science courses. He emphasized the scientific method and famously punctuated his lectures with hand-written notes and colorful hand-drawn figures to illustrate examples of atmospheric phenomena.

Chuck was unmatched in the suite of take-home experiments he developed for his students. Frequently, these numbered 600-800 per semester, and he himself meticulously built the kits in the machine shop during summer recess. In addition, Chuck taught a graduate-level course in atmospheric electricity which was in high demand and very popular.

While still a graduate student, Chuck spent time abroad in France where he learned French and discovered his love of bicycling and the Tour de France. 

Dr. Weidman will be remembered as a world-class researcher, an unparalleled teacher, and a supportive and collaborative colleague with a wonderful dry sense of humor.

Kudos For Joe Biden

Joe Biden remained resolute:

Unlike his three immediate predecessors in the Oval Office, all of whom also came to see the futility of the Afghan operation, Biden alone had the political courage to fully end America’s involvement. 

...Former military officers and intelligence operatives, as well as commentators who had long been advocates of extending America’s presence in Afghanistan, railed against Biden’s artificial deadline. Some critics were former Bush-administration officials or supporters who had gotten the U.S. into the mess in the first place, setting us on the impossible path toward nation building and, effectively, a mission without a clear exit or metric for success. Some were Obama-administration officials or supporters who had doubled down on the investment of personnel in the country and later, when the futility of the war was clear, lacked the political courage to withdraw. Some were Trump-administration officials or supporters who had negotiated with and helped strengthen the Taliban with their concessions in the peace deal and then had punted the ultimate exit from the country to the next administration.

They all conveniently forgot that they were responsible for some of America’s biggest errors in this war and instead were incandescently self-righteous in their invective against the Biden administration. Never mind the fact that the Taliban had been gaining ground since it resumed its military campaign in 2004 and, according to U.S. estimates even four years ago, controlled or contested about a third of Afghanistan. Never mind that the previous administration’s deal with the Taliban included the release of 5,000 fighters from prison and favored an even earlier departure date than the one that Biden embraced. Never mind that Trump had drawn down U.S. troop levels from about 13,000 to 2,500 during his last year in office and had failed to repatriate America’s equipment on the ground. Never mind the delay caused by Trump and his adviser Stephen Miller’s active obstruction of special visas for Afghans who helped us.

Never mind the facts. Never mind the losses. Never mind the lessons.

Biden, they felt, was in the wrong. Despite the criticism, Biden, who had argued unsuccessfully when he was Barack Obama’s vice president to seriously reduce America’s presence in Afghanistan, remained resolute. Rather than view the heartbreaking scenes in Afghanistan in a political light as his opponents did, Biden effectively said, “Politics be damned—we’re going to do what’s right” and ordered his team to stick with the deadline and find a way to make the best of the difficult situation in Kabul.

The Biden administration nimbly adapted its plans, ramping up the airlift and sending additional troops into the country to aid crisis teams and to enhance security. Around-the-clock flights came into and went out of Afghanistan. Giant cargo planes departed, a number of them packed with as many as 600 occupants. Senior administration officials convened regular meetings with U.S. allies to find destinations for those planes to land and places for the refugees to stay. The State Department tracked down Americans in the country, as well as Afghans who had worked with the U.S., to arrange their passage to the airport. The Special Immigrant Visa program that the Trump administration had slowed down was kicked into high gear.

Despite years of fighting, the administration and the military spoke with the Taliban many times to coordinate passage of those seeking to depart to the airport, to mitigate risks as best as possible, to discuss their shared interest in meeting the August 31 deadline. 

...The very last chapter of America’s benighted stay in Afghanistan should be seen as one of accomplishment on the part of the military and its civilian leadership. Once again the courage and unique capabilities of the U.S. armed services have been made clear. And, in a stark change from recent years, an American leader has done the hard thing, the right thing: set aside politics and put both America’s interests and values first.

Burst of Moisture From Remnant of Tropical Storm Nora Arrives in Arizona.

Caldor Fire Burns On

 

Scary times in South Lake Tahoe.

I Don't Appear To Have Covid-19

 All these victories are provisional as long as we are in a pandemic.

Israel in American South Territory

Covid rates in the U.K. (490 daily new confirmed cases in a million) and the U.S. (480) continue to rise in tandem, but the real story is Israel (1,014), where Covid rates are now on a par with the American South (TN 1,030; SC 1,000; AL 990; FL 970; MS 960).