My poor town : (

I'm not sure if its making the news back there, but Santa Barbara is in the midst of yet another wildfire. The last fire through here was in October, named the Tea Fire due to it being started next to a local landmark named the "Tea House".

This one is much closer to Santa Barbara than the last, which was more in the area between SB and Montecito. Montecito is full of big expensive houses from movie stars and the like. During the Tea fire, more than 200 homes burned. This fire has forced more intensive evacuations than the prior fire. Since this is more directly north of the city, the winds created by the canyons swoop over the tops of the hills and down into the SB area. These winds reached speeds up to 80 MPH in October.

I have many friends in the evacuation zones. In October, the highway was closed for a day, and I had a house full of people needing places to stay. I hope they're doing well this time....Its difficult being 7000 miles away and seeing things like that.

My house is relatively safe - I live up on a hill on the other side of town, on the ocean side of Santa Barbara. Its usually a bit wetter on my side, as half the time I'm covered in a cloud. I don't anticipate any issues for us, but fire is an unpredictable animal - you never know what can happen. After the Tea Fire, we found burned bits of paper in our backyard from someone's school books - they were from Westmont College, which was about 7 miles away! Its crazy to see what the fire is capable of.