Hi All,

Today I suffered damage in my home from weather effects. It was considerably warmer here today than it has been in a long time and just that extra bit of warmth brought on a very unexpected event.

Don and I were sitting in front of the computer and reading my daily horoscope when all of the sudden we heard a very loud crash and the sound of breaking glass. As I had the front door open, I wasn't sure if the sound came from an accident outside or something inside. But it sure caught our attention in a hurry. I swear this is only the second time I've seen Don, move so rapidly. Down the stairs he flew because he wanted to be in front of me in case there was any danger. See what a nice guy he is?

Anyway, it turned out the large picture I had in a glass frame over the fireplace fell down and huge shards of glass were all over the hearth and along with it came all of my glass candle holders. So what does the weather have to do with this strange occurrence you may be asking? What happened was that I had hung the picture on two of those paper backed picture holders and the warm weather was just enough to cause drying and the stickiness that held it to the wall was suddenly gone.

After cleaning up the mess, which was considerable, I took the time to test out another picture in a glass frame just down the wall aways and sure enough, it came off extremely easily. A word to the wise here, if you've got your pictures hanging with those paper strips, as the weather gets warm in your area, you may want to refresh them.

I suffered more damage today with this weather related incident than I have from any other natural event since arriving in CA in 1987. But while I'm here now and you're here I'll tell you about the last time I saw Don move really fast.

When I was living in my other house, I had someone watching me and this had been going on for about five months. My sixth sense always told me when this person was around and as Don came to visit frequently he too began to sense the same thing I did. Well, finally one night he went to the kitchen to get a drink and just out of the corner of his eye he saw this mans face looking over the back fence toward the kitchen. He ran out the back door in an attempt to catch him, but alas he escaped. In time we concluded he ran across the street and hid on the embankment of the creek where it was dark and he couldn't be seen. The good news was that after Rapid Don's efforts, he never returned. I honestly thought Don was going to have a heart attack after that run. I felt his chest as he was breathing rapidly and it felt like his heart was going to leap right out of it. But he didn't seem to be any worse for the wear. Don may not be as young as he used to be, but I know one thing for sure, he can move fast when necessary and if not needing to move fast, he's like Dead Eye Dick with a pistol.

The interesting thing is that last week Poor Don was hurting something awful. His back was acting up again and he was in considerable pain. Had that picture fallen last week, I have no doubt I would have beat him down the stairs for sure.

Oh well, tomorrow the weather is supposed to be much cooler but for tonight, it feels like earthquake weather; warm and humid. At least I won't have to worry about pictures coming off the walls tonight if the shaker comes. While it is said there is no such thing as earthquake weather, for an avid earthquake experiencer, I can honestly say, warm and humid are absolute true signs. It was exactly that on the evening that Loma Prieta occurred and was that way many times in the past.

More ready for the big one than ever.....Petra