Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - What a glorious feeling

My 2 year old experiences rain in S. California for one of the few times in his life.

Yes indeed, it has been raining in Southern California for the last couple of days. For an Englishman rain is usually no big deal, but it is if you live in Los Angeles.The rain makes the TV news in a very dramatic way, imagine the equivalent of a heavy blizzard in England.

LA drivers freak out as usually dry roads become slick with the summer's build up of gas, oil and tyre rubber, leading to numerous accidents and emergency vehicles flying around with flashing lights and deafening sirens. The sidewalks are just not built with heavy rain in mind, so crossing the road means jumping over calf deep torrents of water.

 People in affluent hillside communities such as Malibu start sandbagging their multi-million dollar houses in preperation for mudslides, especially if the summer has been particularly bad for forest and brush fires, as these fires have burnt away any foliage that can help hold back the hillside mudslides. The mudslides can lead to 'red tides' where all the contaminents from the hills are swept into the sea leading to a temporary imbalance of the sea's algae, giving the sea a reddish hue in the shallows.

 Personally I kind of like the respite from the usual 70 - 90 degree heat, last night I went out walking with my 2 year old, both of us dressed in our raincoats, we walked hand in hand to the Pacific ocean which is a 1/4 of a mile away from our apartment where I stared at the now  drab, grey sea and  angry  looking monstrous storm clouds on the horizon, while the soft pitter patter of rain rebounded off my waterproof coat, traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway backed up  the coast as far as the the eye could see.

You do get spoiled living in LA and I find that I start to get a little 'cabin fever' after being cooped up in the house staring at the rain for any more than a day or 2.

...................................................HERE'S JOHNNY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!