Smoke and ash drifted over my neighborhood all day today.

[byronius]

Hot, ugly, mean day here. People on edge everywhere. People driving crazy.

People going crazy -- a Trumpish cousin of a friend getting a divorce was insisting that his father-in-law is the Zodiac Killer, and that his ex is conspiring with black men on the internet, promising them sex in exchange for murdering him. She took all his guns -- all eight, including the AR-15, the illegal AK-47, the sawed-off -- how's he going to protect himself from all these black assassins?

I didn't want to start trouble with the guy -- he was talking a mile a minute, assuring me he and his ex are both off the meth now while displaying all the paranoia and the disconnected racing thoughts the drug triggers -- this is a man that should have zero guns. Zero. It made me think all the Trumpies must be stretched to the limit in a different way than we are -- you can live in that bubble until you step off the goddamned cliff and die in that bubble, or some survival mechanism kicks in and tells you to STOP. And when you're pledging allegiance to the Kremlin, that's the cliff-edge, baby. That's the Goddamned End Of It.

The smoke makes everything feel even more apocalyptic than usual. Checker at the Nugget smiles -- "I think I saw this movie on Netflix already.'

Yup.

Rough day in NorCal.

[rusty quoin]

1. Wow, hang in there

[oasis]

2. Just try and get through the week. Better days ahead.

[Squinch]

3. It sounds like the first pages of a Stephen King novel. Be safe.

[CanonRay]

4. It really does!

Same thought struck me.

[Hortensis]

5. Lol. Like that checker.

Hope it gets better for you before long.

We've lived through similar conditions. A number of times over the decades in two western states. I'd say the responses we felt and saw were more appropriate levels of concern than apocalyptic anxiety, with some definite edginess in some whose homes could be at risk, but staying cool. Fire statuses and the smoke were certainly topics of conversation when people met.

Btw, many of those were conservatives. They're not really crazy, of course. Most of the worst of them are authoritarians, though, so if told to evacuate what they'll do is obey, pack up the car and leave. Nevertheless, it would seem best not to hang out near any cliffs just in case their uber leader tells them to run off one. These days they'd be sure to grab you on the way.