This was the scene from our house in a canyon a bit too close for
comfort this afternoon. The “Jesusita Fire” is in full force and it
feels like we've been dealing with serious brush fires in Santa
Barbara every few months over the last year — we become a little more
prepared with each one. Our power has been off and on and the smoke is
definitely not good for Gwendolyn — our biggest immediate concern.
This evening we had to power up our generator (sorry neighborhood) and
everything was going smoothly until we tried to fire up Gwendolyn's
Cough Assist machine — no dice from the generator (sigh). I was so
mad at myself for not checking that before we had an emergency.
Anyway, we're definitely on edge again, but we're doing okay so far.
We'll be watching closely to make sure Gwendolyn handles the heat and
smoke okay and hopefully the fire will be held at bay through the
night (the constant water dropping helicopters overhead are reminding
us how hard all of these firefighters are working to protect all of us).
Thanks so much to everyone for your offers of assistance. We really
appreciate everything and it is very comforting to know that we have
many loving options if we need to leave our home.