So we've had a family of five living in our house since Thursday. They were evacuated on Monday from the Lake Arrowhead area twice - once from the house they were renting, and once from the Rim of the World house they evacuated to. They decided to evacuate Monday to her mother's house. When we checked with them again on Wednesday, we found out that they weren't living in the best of conditions. The parents were in separate twin beds. One of the girls was sleeping on the floor, another on the couch, and one was sleeping on two chairs pushed together.

We have a spare room with a queen bed and two couches that pull out into beds.

We were rather insistent that they move into our house for a while. So Thursday night, our little house that normally had two adults and a cat had four adults, three girls, two dogs, and a cat. Chaos ensued. Now, please don't misunderstand -- I offered the house to this family and am very glad to help. But our quiet house turned into a madhouse. And did I mention that I'm really not a kid person? Yeah, I was just giddy to have all these ... little people ... all over the place.

Saturday, Jen and one of her friends were going to a Scrapbook Expo, so she had invited this friend to stay overnight and scap all day Friday. That plan was made early in the week. Jen made sure her friend knew what was going on, and she decided to go ahead and stay at our house anyway. So Friday, we actually had 5 adults, 3 kids, 2 dogs, and 1 cat. And because the scapping session ran late into the night, that was same situation Saturday.

Anyway, the family was able to get up to the Arrowhead house today, and all was fine. Their food was spoiled, but that was about it. Not even the smell of smoke in the house, which is pretty darned cool. So they called me to say that they are throwing out the food, will come back down to pick up their stuff from our house, have dinner, and go back up the hill. They are ansy to get back home, which I understand. To be honest, I'm ansy to get my quiet house back.

Ah, west and welaxation at wast. =)

Jen just called. She's going to be out of school for the rest of the week due to smoke and ash.

If you want to get a good idea why everyone in SoCal is nervous right now, look at this Google Map provided by the LA Times.

Then realize that new fires are popping up like the Cajon fire (just added to the map four minutes ago) and that a quarter of a million people have been evacuated in San Diego alone.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why we're nervous. And scared.