Dakota Ridge Fire

Well, I sat down yesterday afternoon to hammer out a blog entry as I have really been trying to post every day. Typing, typing, blah, blah, blah, Deep Thought, Deep Thought. Phone rings. It's my friend. "HOLY CRAP, MOL.....the Hogback is on fire". What?! Look outside. Don't see anything. Think she's crazy. Back to typing. Phone rings again. "MOL. YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS". Okay, okay......go upstairs and ask Jack and his friend if they would like to accompany me to witness the apocalypse. Nope. They can't be bothered. Something about X-Box 360. Fine. It's your funeral. Drive to the appointed meeting place on the side of the road. Lots of other rubberneckers were in attendance. It was like a little neighborhood party minus the booze and nudity. *I've personally never witnessed nudity at a neighborhood party but it sounds colorful so I thought I'd toss that in* Anyway, there was indeed a rather raging fire burning up the Eastern facing slope and threatening to go over to the other side which is uh.........WHERE WE LIVE????!!!! So, we watched until my friends daughter got a bloody nose. Only blood could drive us from a dramatic scene. Stupid nose. Go back and watch the news (and intermittently drive down to the country club parking lot where I could get a good view of the flames leaping over our side of the mountain. Lest you all panic, it's all good now. They were able to contain it and everything is fine (except for me not blogging yesterday and oh.......the huge black scar going up the side of the Hogback. Here's what gets me. They think the fire was started by some fucktard tossing a cigarette out the window from the neighboring highway. Of all of the numerous things that bug me in the world, that has got to be the topper. If you want to smoke, knock yourself out. Hell, I myself smoked until I found myself in an MRI machine because I had a "suspicious spot" on my lung. At that point in time I made a deal with God/the universe that if I didn't have cancer I would never smoke again. I didn't and I haven't. But I get the addictive nature of cigarettes. They suck. I feel sorry for people still in nicotine's clutches. If you've never smoked you wouldn't understand. But what I find to be the very height of arrogance is to smoke and then toss the cigarette, WHICH IS ON FIRE, out the window. Is the thinking, "Gee, I don't mind if I inhale this thing into my person but I certainly don't want it stinking up my car!!!!"? What do you think is going to happen with that thing that again IS ON FIRE after you flick it out the window????? Nothing? Maybe nothing but maybe something. And if you're too stupid to figure that one out you are surely too stupid to be driving a car. How 'bout if we try to toss flaming bags of dog poop into your car???? How'd you like that? Because although all's well that ends well, our community surely spent a shit-load of money taking care of the result of one act of stupidity. And it could have been a helluva lot worse. It certainly caused a bit of excitement in these parts. Livened up a Monday afternoon. And snarled traffic all over the metro area. It took Dave an hour and a half to get home from downtown when normally it takes 30 minutes. So I hope whoever is responsible feels just lovely about themselves. I'm pretty sure cars still have ashtrays. If you don't want that shit in your car, we sure as hell don't want it tossed onto the side of our mountain. It's amazing how the actions of one moron can change the course of an afternoon. I'll have to remember that the next time the urge to do something moronic moves me. Which is sometimes hourly.