Mudslide Season

Well, the Jet Stream finally picked up it's typical El Nino pattern. It's right overhead and roaring 180 mph. Starting last Sunday, we've had a storm-a-day come through and dump about an inch of rain each. We got one more to go, tomorrow. It's supposed to be the strongest of them all. Another one to three inches of rain for us, eight for the foothills and I don't know how many feet for snow for the elevations above 3500 feet. There's been concern of mudslides where last fall's wildfires burned pretty much everything for 400 square miles just north of LA. When a wildfire roars through, it chemically changes the soil in a way that just seals it. When it rains a lot on this bare ground, almost 100% of it runs off, downhill. Pretty soon, lots of mud, water and rocks are roaring down the hills. Then, boulders join in, knocking down trees and, well, you get the picture. Never live at the top or the bottom of a hill in Cowlifornia. Anyway, there has been major preparations everywhere for this series of storms including concrete K-Rails, sandbags, diversion walls, cleaned out storm drains. The media has already dubbed their coverage "Stormwatch 2010!". They always do that kind of thing, don't they? Giving some goofy media label to an event. When I moved here 10 years ago, the first sprinkles of the season demanded TV reporters everywhere, umbrellas open, talking live, promoting, "Stormwatch 2000"...... With one more storm to go, most of Southern Cowlifornia has survived. There was a waterspout off Huntington Beach that came ashore and did some minor damage yesterday, a waterspout off Manhattan Beach (next to where Cuz'n Ric lived) and a white-out in the Grapevine (Interstate 5 going from LA to the Central Valley) causing the Interstate to be closed for hours in both directions. Thunderstorms here. That's a rarity. I think we've had about 3 or 4 thunderstorms in the last 10 years. Lots of your normal run-of-the-mill idiots who drive like it was 70 degrees and sunny. I see 'em a few miles down the freeway, upside down in the guardrail. By today, almost all of the drivers were using common sense, driving safely. Of course, it was pouring down rain and nobody could drive faster than 40 mph even if they wanted to. We need the rain in Southern Cowlifornia badly and it's very welcome. Just remember, don't live on the top or bottom of a hill out here.
Here's a picture I took at the beach late this afternoon. Today's storm had just passed and the waves were about 8-10 feet at the biggest. I added contrast to the raw photo which made the jetty rocks look fake - their not. (Yesterdays storm had 20 foot waves and damaged the pier. It's closed for repairs right now). This picture is 'shrunk' by the blog to fit this page so if you want a nice biggie to scroll around and catch all the crashing and smashing, lemme know and I'll e-mail it to you.