Derelict House...

...or just the devastated hills around it? I was sitting on the porch today trying to capture the birds in the trees instead of on the feeders and noticed the house for the first time. John says it has always been there but that they must have cut some major trees around it so that it shows up more. And we have certainly cut down most of the wall of foliage that stood between us and this view. 

I did get one picture of a house finch in the plum tree which is showing a lot of buds. I put it in extras to counteract the depressing main image.

I took this with a telephoto lens and can't tell if the house is occupied.It  looks quite undamaged, but I don't see how it could have survived the devastation all around it. Perhaps it has been repaired, but I can't imagine how depressing it would be to live in it. The hill it is on faces the porch end of our house and is where we saw the flames coming our way when we evacuated. The trees took a total hit and are clearly not coming back. There has been a lot of tree clearing up in these hills, the remains of which washed down the creek and created the massive log jam there. Many agencies have been contacted, ( Sonoma County, Department of Fish and Game, the Army Corps of Engineers, Pacific Gas & Electric) every one refers Bruce and Cindy to yet another and nobody has yet accepted responsibility or agreed to clean it up.

I sanded our porch furniture which got quite mildewed underneath the protective covers, John put on two coats of teak oil, and I wiped off the excess as per instructions. Two chairs down, one loveseat to go. Not all the mildew came off but we decided it was just part of the patina of outdoor furniture. 

The warm springlike weather continues but the windy conditions yesterday started a fire in Big Sur. Difficult terrain is making it difficult to put out and there has been no rain in January, so things are beginning to get quite dry again. Mutterings of fire season lasting year round have joined the mutterings on whether we will have to learn to live with Covid and face masks. I suspect the answer to both is yes.