A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Well, not really. In the above picture, you may think you're looking at thunderheads, but it is actually a wildfire burning out of control in the Angeles National Forest, and coming rather close to some very expensive houses up in those hills. This is taken on Lake Avenue, about two blocks from our house. We were on our way to the supermarket for weekly shopping on Saturday when I took this. I couldn't get the entire plume into the frame, and you can't see the flames at the base of the clouds, though one new plume is visible at the center of the frame: that cloud is in front of the mountains, not behind them.

The air is smokey. It makes your mouth feel gritty, your eyes sore and produces the most prodigious boogers you can imagine. Everything outside smells like a barbecue. Luckily, there's a lot of town to burn between us and the hills, so I think we are safe from harm. But still, we were in Petsmart today and some friends of ours who live up in the hills were buying a carrier for their cat as she was "freaking out" because of the proximity of the fires. I think, too, it was part of getting ready to evacuate, but they were too nervous to say it out loud. Here's a time lapse I found online. It gives you an idea of the explosive quality of this fire (called the Station Fire):

Time Lapse Test: Station Fire from Eric Spiegelman on Vimeo.

And it's HOT! Hot hot hot. Today was around 104, tomorrow will be 101. Thank God there are no winds to speak of, or this situation could be much worse. Still, there's a lot of brush up there to burn (last fire was back in the early '50s). It's so strange, because August has been very mild all month, and now the heat wave hits and everything's burning.

The job search goes on for me. There are lots of design jobs out there, but they are all for the Web. I'm ploughing my way through learning Flash and Dreamweaver. I have actually put together an animation where the images fade in as they slide onto the screen and then a pop-up frame with a description appears when you roll over each image. Only took me about an hour and a half! Recently, I've been converting PDF files of my work at the Hollywood Reporter for use on an upcoming Web site. It's quite a job to wade through the files, find the ones I like the best and get them prepped for use as buttons, images, etc.

Steve's job is going very strangely. He's the accountant/office manager at a plastic manufacturing place here in Pasadena. This next week they are laying off everyone in production because of lack of work. Steve and the two other office staff will be going to work, but it certainly does make us nervous. The gentleman who owns and runs the place is almost 90 years old, and sometimes his memory and judgment don't seem as clear as they might need to be. So we just take it day by day and hope for the best.

Last night we had the police pull a guy over outside the house. They got him out of the car and handcuffed him, then started searching the car: It was like having an episode of "Cops" unfold in our living room window. It was a very strange occurrence, sort of unsettling and entertaining at the same time.

I'm sure you've all heard about the woman who was kidnapped as a child in in the early '90s and turned up in the back yard of her abductors' house in Antioch, Calif., along with the two girls she bore with her abductor. Here's a really creepy Internet coincidence for you all to experience:

Go to Google Maps. In the address, put 1554 Walnut, Antioch, CA, and click on the street view when the map appears. This is the Garrido house where the girl was held. You'll notice a beat-up old Ford Econoline van sitting in the driveway. In the street view, you can pan around. There are also arrows on the street so you can move up and down the street.

Click on the left arrow to go down Walnut. As you progress down the street, turn your view to the rear and you will see the van pull out of the driveway and follow you. Once you get to Bown Street, take a right turn. The van will continue to follow you to the end of the street. On the final frame you can zoom in on the van and actually see Phillip Garrido sitting in the van. Very creepy. Also, if you click back to the map and go to the satellite view, you can see the compound of blue tarpaulin-covered structures out behind the house. This whole thing feels like the Charles Manson episode, except without the murder. And there's a chance that that will become part of the story before it's all over.

It's been a very strange month, indeed. Aunt Kit's passing, Ted Kennedy as well, this hellish weather, the bizarre culmination of an 18-year-old kidnapping case and now driving down the street to the sight of clouds of smoke rising to the north, seeing the flames lick over the edges of the canyons, one by one, seemingly unstoppable. And with no real routine in my life, it all seems to be terribly, terribly random. I keep hoping for some kind of epiphany where I will see the fabric and the texture of life as it's unfolding these days, but it just doesn't happen.

Perhaps I'm not looking hard enough, or perhaps I'm looking too hard. Or maybe the quality of the chaos of the universe just isn't terribly attractive at this time, from this vantage point. All I can say is, it's been one hell of a year so far.