This was the view as I came home from my piano lesson in the Bay Area today. The photo was taken from a turnoff about half a mile west of our house. You’re looking a bit north of east. The fire is 15 miles away — not a danger to us, but too close for comfort.

The easterly wind in the late night and early morning brings the smoke right to us. We smell it when we wake up, and sometimes see it as a haze that starts a couple of hundred yards away. Then the wind changes, and by mid-morning the air is clear again.

We saw one of these fly right over us a couple of days ago. I thought it was a commercial jet at first, but it was much too low for that. I didn’t know that they’ve been using converted DC-10s as firefighting tankers for a few years now.