For anyone considering traveling to or from SD tomorrow:

I am in Bakersfield. We have some smoke, but no where near the fire.

I'm glad to hear that! You all keep safe out there.

It's still smoky here but the visibility is much better today. I didn't even try but I don't think I can get to work still (there's only two of us so we're just checking in remotely).

Schools are cancelled for the rest of the week. Maddy's bored already.

MW glad you guys are all ok.

It’s an eerie feeling coming in to work today. I’ve been deemed “essential” and needed to report to work on time, at 8am.
It has the feel of a Sunday morning; no cars on the freeway, I slept in thirty minutes.
But then there are the odd parts of my Sunday drive.
The thick smell of smoke in the air.
The Starbucks by my home is not open for business.
And as I stood in the parking lot of the Starbucks halfway between home and work, taking photos of the sky for a displaced Californian, it was snowing.
At least, for five seconds I thought it was. The ashes were falling from the sky all around me. I hadn’t seen flakes like this since the flurries when I lived in Denver. For those of you non snow types, large ash, as if you had just thrown a stack of newspaper on the bonfire, or the size of chocolate shavings on a cake.
The sky is a beautiful, serene, yet frightening orange as the sun rises. I hate to leave my son and mother behind at home, but I have a bag packed in my car, and things in a pile should they need to leave in my absence, but as I said, I was deemed “essential”


(picture was not edited for color, as my monitor is darker than most. and if you need to resize, go ahead mods))

Geesh. This is just frightening. :(

I'm glad you're all safe. Know that you have many friends up north who can put you up, should you need it.

Assuming I can travel north. I heard the I-5 was closed.
We're supposed to be at the El Cap on Sunday, at this moment I have no idea if we can go.

Keep safe, everyone.

Ken said they're getting a lot of evacuees coming into Target.

We think that some folks might be keeping their kids calm with an impromptu trip to Disneyland or something, because it seems odd to come all the way up to a main resort area. Unless, it's the only area with rooms still available.

Hey, if you have to be an evacuee the Grand Californian sound a lot better than a football stadium. I hope they cut locals a big price break during this event.