World On Fire

I’m sure you’ve seen and heard the news – Southern California is facing some of the worst wildfires our local Fire Chief himself has seen in 30 years... Thankfully it’s no earthquake – but it’s equally as threatening & devastating to those who have lost their homes, and the families of the two firefighters who lost their lives to the fires last weekend. 2,000 homes have been evacuated, and another 10,000 are still considered under threat. They're hoping for a date of containment of September 15th - still 2 weeks away. It's been declared a state of emergency.

Living just over a few miles South of the Hills, they’re never out of sight – and right now you can see, smell, taste & feel the smoke in the air. It’s about 10 degrees hotter than it should be this time of year – which you can imagine, is HOT. It also means that combined with the smog and regularly poor air quality, outdoor exercise is strongly discouraged. One morning a week a new friend and I (a fellow Canadian from Vancouver) hike Runyon Canyon – as I’ve said before, it’s my favorite thing to do in LA – you get a great view of the city, the Hollywood sign (albeit cheesy) - and with numerous trails offering different levels of difficulty, you can definitely get your sweat on... We’re skipping this week, with the smoke we’d likely both end up with coughs, or worse – it’s a much lower altitude, but the amount of accessible oxygen in the air is comparable to Kilimanjaro & Everest Base Camp – without the glory!

On a much lighter note, this week’s celebrity sighting was Bob Harper – the male trainer from "The Biggest Loser" – I’m not sure if he’s into women... but he’s totally cute. I saw him at Starbucks Monday after learning my hard drive that died last week is a lost cause and I've lost almost all of my data (the files on my external back up can’t be read) - awesome. Thankfully his adorableness and friendly smile lifted my spirits!! I chickened out before I could tell him I'm a big fan - so Bob if you're out there - keep up the great work!

k