"The Old Man and the Old Sea" - Green Valley Theatre Company - 08/18/23

Went last night with Rachel to see Green Valley's "The Old Man and the Old Sea" at Big Idea Theater on Del Paso Blvd. It's a wonderful show, and surpassingly strange. It was nice seeing Stephanie Hodson and Megan "Tilly" O'Laughlin onstage again. Lots of new and unfamiliar people doing very well.

Afterwards, we visited Nour's Cafe.  It was great to find a cafe open at late hours.  Ate a Chocolate Volcano thang with vanilla ice cream, plus decaf.

Southern California Mass Extinctions Were Caused by Fire

Fire changed everything:

Yet even modest numbers of humans literally burned their way into history. As soon as humans arrive on the scene, “suddenly, there’s tons of fire in the record,” Lindsey said.

These massive fires changed everything, the researchers argue. While their sources of ignition were quite different from the power lines and exhaust pipes that tend to spark fires today, our Pleistocene ancestors had few tools at their disposal to extinguish a blaze once it spread out of control.

Once-abundant junipers and oaks could tolerate drought, but had no defenses against fire. They disappeared, and fire-adapted pines and chaparral took their place. In a landscape stripped of shade, shelter and hiding places, food chains were upended. Intense fire may have altered water flows or cut off migration routes.

According to the fossil record, all of this devastation took barely 200 years. 

“This is the most significant extinction since a meteor slammed into Earth and wiped out all the big dinosaurs. It’s probably the first pulse of the extinction crisis that we’re in today,” Lindsey said.

"Theater Camp"

"Theater Camp" is a very charming movie about a dysfunctional summer theater camp in the Adirondacks. Very odd, but also very affecting. "Jiggle like a jackal!" "90% of you won't make it. You'll end up in a mental hospital, or on a go-go box in Hell's Kitchen!"

 

Here Comes Hilary!

Weather forecasts for Southern California are beginning to look alarming this weekend, as Hurricane Hilary will cross central Baja California and its remnants will plunge headlong into California’s Colorado and Mojave Deserts, and then on into the Great Basin. Lots of rain for dry western deserts (sorry Phoenix), but also lots of destructive flooding. 

A pessimist looks at Hurricane Hilary and offers his advice.

@demonuneed23 #hurricanehillary ♬ original sound - Demonuneed23

There are only two good paths that Pacific hurricanes can follow to get close enough to the U.S. to make a major impact: along the Gulf of California (Sea of Cortéz), or by hugging the western Baja California coast and taking full advantage of what warm water there is there. Hilary is taking the second path. 

Other storms have tried to make it (I was SO excited by Nora in 1997, but it exhausted itself before reaching the Colorado River valley). Hilary looks like the real deal, however. 

Halfway up the Baja coast the water abruptly turns chilly, and a tropical storm will rapidly disintegrate, but if it’s big enough and moving fast enough it might retain enough power to make an impact. Hilary is big enough and moving fast enough. 

Hilary will disintegrate over the driest deserts in North America (Colorado, Mojave); deserts that are underlaid by water-impermeable caliche soil, and are thus incapable of quickly absorbing large amounts of water. Raging torrents are inevitable. It will be scary.

Orwell's Shorsightedness

California Water - An Era of Good Feelings

When there's enough water, everyone's happy:

As rivers gorged with snowmelt begin to recede, and egrets glide over catch basins brimming with runoff, officials say that an aggressive and collaborative response — as well as a cooler-than-anticipated spring — helped them avoid massive community flooding and damage to the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the city’s century-old water lifeline.

While an armada of heavy equipment remains at the ready to shore up flooding infrastructure and clear debris, forecasters expect the region’s waterways to return to normal by next month.

“Fortunately, much of the region experienced a long cool spring and cooler-than-expected beginning of summer,” said aqueduct manager Adam Perez.

Overall, the flow of snowmelt streaming down the Sierra has been manageable, and has triggered only minor damage, he said.