Meme of the Week - California State Bird

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CaliforniaDisasters @CalDisasters

#WhittierFire $ #AlamoFire in one image. Alamo Fire is at 19000 ac & 10% cont'd. Whiittier Fire has closed Hwy 154. #SundownerWinds tonight! pic.twitter.com/V0n05U6caG

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Picture of the Day - Aerial Alamo Imagery

I encountered this image on Twitter tweeted by the San Luis Obispo FD. Without dispute in my mind, the photographer of it shot the best image of today's 3,000-acre Alamo Fire blow-up east of Santa Maria, CA. It was captured from an aircraft I presume. The perspective is looking southward with the Santa Maria Valley in the background and Twitchell Reservoir to the immediate right of the base of the fire. My images of this fire taken today can be viewed HERE.

Alamo Fire Chase

This afternoon the Alamo Fire, which began in southern San Luis Obispo County yesterday afternoon just north of Highway 166 near Alamo Canyon Road, exploded in the triple digit heat making a run southwards at Highway 166 for the second day in a row. This time it successfully got established south of the highway connecting Bakersfield and Santa Maria and ran amok in the ridges and flats in the vicinity of Twitchell Reservoir. In just a few hours it jumped from 250 acres to 3,400 acres.

This view is from a parking lot adjacent to southbound Highway 101 at the south Spring Street on-ramp looking southeast from Paso Robles, CA. At this point I was en route to meet up with mom and go hunt this fire and see how close we could get and perhaps get some interesting images of it. Note the pyrocumulus cloud atop the main convection column.

This was the view southward from the southern end of the Huasna Valley as mom and I sought to get in as close to this fire as possible. A couple of miles later we turned around at a gate on Huasna River Road.

On the drive into Huasna Valley we encountered several horse trailers filled with horses rapidly been driven out of the valley headed westward with grim faces

On the drive home we encountered a fair amount of radio traffic regarding a "Tower Incident." Given how crummy the radio and cell signal strength is out in Huasana Valley and environs we had missed the initial response to a new serious fire back closer to home atop the Cuesta Grade as started by a car fire on the northbound side of Highway 101.

We passed the Tower Fire on the drive home. The traffic backup on the northbound side of Highway 101 was actually a nightmarish crawl from San Luis Obispo to the top of the grade where the causal car fire was located. By the time we actually got to the fire almost an hour after first entering the queue the fire was pretty much done. I'm still not entirely sure why CAL FIRE needed to close down two of three lanes instead of one of three lanes. 

Here is the causal crispy car that started it all with the CAL FIRE prevention officer busy  investigating why the car caught fire. The Tower Fire started explosively but rapidly lost steam when once its own convection column blocked out the sun and plunged the fire area into a rather dark overcast. The fire burned 58 acres per the air attack.

The smoke from the Alamo Fire veered northwestward and northward from the fire contrary to the predicted Sundowner Winds tonight. This created an ominous smoky sunset over the North County. I shot this image from the northbound Highway 101 park & ride at Curbaril Avenue in Atascadero. All images by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).
*NOTE: to view a professionally-photographed image of today's fire action go HERE.

Picture of the Day - Muh Limoncello

A week ago, with the major assistance of a dear friend of mine who is a master of making a great many different sorts of things, most importantly, limoncello, I produced a large batch of final stage limoncello which I brought out into the light of day earlier this evening for your perusal. Now begins the wait for this to mature. I plan to roll out each bottle over different intervals of time and see which is best or at what point a desirable flavor threshold baseline is achieved that applies to multiple bottles. For my previous post about this project go HERE. Photo by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).

Snowflakes Is No Snowflake

Yesterday, quite by accident, I found this most aurally sumptuous, haunting, dreamy and atmospheric track that is an amazing example of apparently yet another subgenre of electronica that has heretofore never appeared on this blog until now, to wit, bass & drums. It is titled "Snowflakes" and was released in 2011 by Teutonic husband & wife dynamic duo Rawtekk. Youtube deejay Suicide Sheep, one of my all-time faves, posted it on his channel accompanied by scenes from the 2007 anime film 5 Centimeters Per Second to which is not in any way related and yet strangely fits well with.

Flies Better Than A Pterodactyl

Last night at Schooners Wharf Restaurant & Bar near the end of their annual July 4th party, employee Kat acting as their in-house deejay played this tune which got the whole house dancing like no other track played all night. I was infected by it myself but managed to avoid dancing except inside my mind. I had to know what this track was called and by whom so I ascended to the second story and tracked down Kat who was on the roof which by this point acted as stage for Kat deejaying and periodic go-go dancing. I learned from her assistant who was playing it off his iPhone that it was "Flight Of The Pterodactyl" by Dirtybird BBQ-co-founder Christian Martin & Iranian-American producer Ardalan, this being the first sampling ever on this blog of yet another subgenre of electronica called "tech-house." I may need to check out more techno-house this summer and see how many more tracks of this quality can be found. A better audio sampling of this track can be heard HERE.

Picture of the Day - Schooners July 4th Partay

For the third time out of the past four years, I worked a 12-hour shift (noon to midnight) at Schooners Wharf Restaurant & Bar in Cayucos, CA. This event used to be much more wild and unruly and was once legendary in the early years of Vino Vice as it was notorious for how many people had to be kicked off the property by our guards due to fighting and drunkenness and such. Over time, the ownership has refined the process and now it is a smoothly operating machine sans any notable issues. It is still a circus (in a good way) making it an epic job to annually work as the people-watching is still top-of-the-line but there are no problems of the sort to make working it unpleasant. Each year at about 9:30 p.m. a fireworks show launched from the Cayucos Pier captivates a huge crowd who comes from all over the Central Coast (and Central Valley) to watch it. Part and parcel with that is an epic party at Schooners where a heavily local and youngish crowd come to have fun. Above is a view from below of the second-floor deck crammed with patrons watching the fireworks show. Go HERE to sample one of the tracks got had this establishment rocking. Photo by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).

Picture of the Day - Pepper Tree House Deck

This afternoon into this evening I worked a wedding at Pepper Tree Ranch in Edna Valley, several miles south of San Luis Obispo, CA. It features one of my favorite structures in San Luis Obispo County, certainly my favorite treehouse. For images of two other views of this concrete & metal treehouse deck which appears deceivingly organic in composition go HERE.
Photo by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).