It's been raining for like the past week, and with
the extended forecast calling for more and more of the same, that doesn't look likely to change. I don't mind the rain, though it does get a bit monotonous. I do miss the cold weather though; it was in the low 30s at night a few weeks ago, and since it's started raining it's been mid 40s at the coldest, and upper 50s in the day. In other words, not cold enough to require a coat to go outside, unless you're going to be standing around out there for a while. I'd love to wear a coat more often, I've got a nice leather one and everything, and it feels toasty during the walk to the car and from the car to our indoor destination, but once I'm there, wherever there is, I'm hot in a coat, and I soon tire of carrying the damn thing around.
Yes, life is hard in modern civilization.
As for the rain, it's been fun to listen to and watch and such. It rains quite a bit in most parts of Northern California, but
the rainy months cluster, and we hardly see a cloud from April - October. On the other hand, it rains at least weekly during November, December, January, February, and March, and since we're still just two months into that, water from the sky is still sort of a novelty. I'll be sick of it by February, I suspect, what with my desire for any sort of outdoor activity constantly constrained by puddles and mud.
It rained far less
in my former home, though the months that could kindly be called "the rainy season" were basically the same. It's just that in San Diego the temperatures were 10-15 degrees hotter at all times, and in between days of rain you'd get one of the hated Santa Ana days with an offshore flow and highs in the 90s. In January. My basically-vampirific nature shudderes at the memory.
In San Diego, I never expected anyone to be able to drive in the rain. It hardly ever rained, and usually when it did the roads had been dry for months, and were therefore quite slippery and dangerous with all the oil and car residue floating on the surface. There I could understand why some people got so overly-cautious and tentative in even a light mist.
Now that I'm living in the Bay Area though, where it rains damn near every day 5 months of the year, I'm confused though. As I remarked to Malaya the other day, as we were ambling our way along the damp I-24 in a very light mist, stuck in a light flow of traffic that was putting along at maybe 50, when it would usually have been proceeding at 70+ on that same road at that same time of day, "Perhaps someday man will invent some sort of black, rubber-like substance that can be formed into automobile tires and enable vehicles to safely traverse slightly-moist roads."
Ahh, to dream.
In other wet-related news, the cats are unhappy. Well, let me amend that. Jinx is unhappy. Dusty could give a shit, since he's never outside for more than a few minutes at a time anyway, what with the soft and beckoning couch, chair, bed, carpeted floor, and various human laps available to him. Jinxie though, likes to go outside and look at nature and chak-chak-chak at the squirrels and smell the air. She doesn't much enjoy it when the outdoor carpets on the back patio are all squishy and there's moisture in the air though, and it's all she can do to find a merely-damp spot and hunker there for a while with her tail wrapped around her feet and her body quite compacted.
A couple of days ago she was standing by the sliding glass door and making entreating noises, and I opened the door while saying to her, "You won't like it."
I say "saying to her" but let's be honest, it's not like the cats know or care what the hell words are coming out of our mouths. We talk to them to hear ourselves talk, or to entertain the other humans in earshot. Malaya, in this case.
Jinxie disregarded my words and shot right out the door, stopped, paused, then whirled and came straight back in, prrrfafing and brruping her displeasure as she headed across the room for some more Friskies. And there was much merriment at her expense. Don't worry kitty, it'll be dry again in 3 or 4 months. Of course that's like 3 years in cat years, which gots to suck, if you're her.
