Wind

I believe I mentioned, a few posts back, that it hasn't been so windy this year. That was true, a few posts back. No, it's still true -- overall, it's been less windy. But Sunday and Monday we had a wind storm, so now I'm all jacked up again about Ridgecrest being windy. And since spring is really just getting started, we could have just as much wind this year as last.

Bad winds out here are called "termination winds," because in the early days bad wind storms would cause people to terminate their employment with the Navy at China Lake.

Apparently yesterday it was so bad that they actually closed Highway 14 to big rigs and campers/RVs. A big rig blew over and that was the end of that. The Daily Independent even wrote an editorial about how to drive in the wind, the gist of which was "Don't."

I drove to the grocery store in the wind yesterday, taking care to open my car door slowly and carefully so that all my shopping bags wouldn't blow away, as happened once last year. When I was leaving the store, I found that the automatic doors weren't working -- they were just sort of waving gently in the wind -- so I had to shove one of them open in order to get out. Then, in the parking lot, I heard a scream, and watched as a cart went zooming across the lot toward a car. A man bravely grabbed it before it hit and returned it to a young woman with a baby. I was careful to return my cart to the cart-return place, but the wind actually almost blew it away anyway.

The twins and I tried to take a walk that morning, but the wind got much worse after we'd gone half a block, and we had to cut it short. The boys sat in their stroller and pulled their sun shades down to block the wind, while I valiantly pushed against the wind to get us home.

In the afternoon, after my shopping trip, I sat at my computer and tried to concentrate, but the howling wind got under my skin.

Boulder actually has worse winds than Ridgecrest, but they're not as frequent. And they don't involve dust clouds.

I suppose I should make some comment about the metaphorical wind blowing in change, but it just wasn't a metaphorical wind. That said, change would be welcome.