… and to love you. Well, maybe not the last bit - but I do need the former and it’d better be bloody good quality too. However, these past few weeks it’s not been that good around here, that’s for sure.

Now, air quality in California is not stellar at the best of times, but it got much, much worse about 2 weeks ago when a huge electrical storm (that I didn’t even notice) passed through Northern California and set the already drought ridden landscape ablaze. Right now approximately 1,781 fires have burned nearly 668,000 acres and have cost and arm and a leg to fight. There are about 323 fires still burning. Word on the streets is that the state fire season usually begins in late August but this has now become a year-round phenomenon - I wonder why … (answers on a postcard, please).

The thick smoke in the air is choking. Over the past weeks, the smell of smoke has come and gone, depending on which way the wind blows. When it’s present, it is overwhelming as it fills your lungs and stings your eyes. I’ve never experienced it like this before (unless you count the bonfires we used to have as kids where the smoke would follow you wherever you sat and you’d end up with a black face). Yeah, it’s like that.

According to the people who collate interesting facts, air pollution kills about 9,000 people a year in California and this is certainly not helping that statistic and, to top it all, the temperature here is now reaching 110 degrees in the afternoons with no signs of it abating. To say that it feels unhealthy is an understatement and with the local news telling us to not to do anything that requires breathing unless absolutely necessary, it’s started to create a bit of panic in the environs.

So, all we can do is hold our breath, wait it out and hope that this was our fire season and that nature doesn’t have anything else up her sleeve …