Cloudy weather & you can still be healthy!
Even when it’s cloudy outside a 10-15 minute walk can give you the same amount of vitamin D! It’s good for your skin and your mood! Researchers suggest 10-15 minutes spent outside at least 2 times a week to get your vitamin D intake. After 15 minutes, it’s suggested you put on sunblock though… because that’s when the UV rays start harming your skin!
Taken from this New York Times article.
I’m such a believer in this! Not so sure about the cloudy days… but I don’t spend a lot of time outside on cloudy days (and there aren’t many up here in northern LA county!), maybe it’s time I start!
Snow capped mountains
All the rain and cold weather here in LA has created a beautiful back drop of snowy mountains here in Valencia! This is the view out the window by my desk at work. It feels a bit like Colorado!
Back from Mexico and my house is safe!
I’ll expand more on the Mexico trip next entry… but on Tuesday I received word from the Passenger Services Desk that my neighborhood in LA was evacuated due to fires in the area. A message from my boss… It put a damper on the vacation a bit but we were still able to enjoy ourselves a bit. We were tuned into CNN in our room watching any footage possible to see if we could find anything about our house.
The fires were just across the wash from us about half a mile East. Josh’s parents were watching our house and dogs and were advised to evacuate and waited it out and then the evacuation was called off.
Here are some photos from our neighborhood area:
I’m partially happy I wasn’t home because I heard the sky was as dark as night at 2 in the afternoon and it was so smokey, you could barely breath and it burnt everyone’s throats. But I sort of wish I was there just in case to pack my bags and be ready!
now playing: “won ton tomatoooooo is stuck in my head!”
Full Lunar Eclipse!
Josh and I heard on the news about the full lunar eclipse last night and there hasn’t been one since 2004. It sounded cool, but waking up at 2:58 AM to see it… not so cool. So we just went to bed and waited for the morning to watch it on the news. But then somehow Josh woke up at 2:56 AM! He woke me up and we saw it and I tried to get a photo of it. It looked awesome. Sort of glowing red like and dark enough that you can get the sky and photo subject matter looking correct. Photographers will tell you, you can’t get a good shot of the moon and your subject matter (if it’s not the moon!), you will get one or the other and you must do some photoshop magic to get them both 
Of course the photo doesn’t do it justice… but I thought it was kind of cool. 20 second shutter with my f1.4 Sigma lens
now playing: Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Down Boy
BEAUTIFUL WEEKEND!
Josh is lucky, he got a beautiful sunny warm (80 degree) weekend for his birthday Played with the doggies in the yard. Mandy loves it outside. Dupe wanted in. Here’s a pic of Damien and Mandy:
It’s official, I need to buy gloves
It’s been so cold here in LA lately, and Valencia in particular that I’ve been wearing 2 coats and a scarf everyday. And today as I started walking into work, it started snowing. I thought I left Buffalo to get away from the snow/cold?! It looks pretty but if you’re accustomed to snow you know that when it’s 38 degrees and snowing it’s that wet snow that melts and never accumulates. So as soon as it touches the ground it turns to water/slush.
Apparantly this long cold spell is not just annoying Angelinos, it’s also affecting all the crops up here and in Ventura county. Lots of oranges, strawberries, and avocados have died from the frost and cold temperatures.. so in the next 2 weeks we’re supposed to expect a huge price jump in those. I wonder if it will affect the East Coast too, i know they get a lot of their stuff from Florida.
I wish I got a photo of the snow this morning but after I sent my text message to all my friends about the snow, my phone battery died and with it goes the possible opportunity for a kodak moment.
Here’s a pic from KCAL of the 5 fwy north about 3 exits up the road from me near Castaic Lake:
hot hot heat
damn these 100 degree temps are getting expensive, the electric bill is jumping with all the AC we’re pumping in the house. good thing the humidity isn’t as high as the east coast, i really can’t stand that heat + humidity deal.
i posted the pics i took in buffalo. see photo gallery link on right.
now playing: Liars - The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack
