Trash Day After The Storm

It must be Tuesday.

I live in the Sierra foothills, the lower reaches of the mountains. We are less hot than Auburn at more than twice the elevation, but don't get much snow like higher up. This is the sweet spot, basically. Over Labor Day weekend, a long narrow storm swept in stretching from Tracy to Nevada dumping most of its rain here, bringing lightning and thunder along with it. It managed to flash the power with a few hits, but no apparent fires. There was sufficient rain to spread soil and gravel on the various roads, and wash the accumulated dust down the drains and streams. I washed my car on Saturday morning to get the dust off. The rain took off the rest.

The air is clean, no trace of smoke. This above picture I took an hour ago on my walk in the neighborhood. This being the sweet spot for weather, folks retire up here. Some of the people in these houses work, but most are retired. Its 45 minutes to Roseville, and closer to an hour to Sacramento. That's a lot of gasoline to be able to live without gunshots or crackheads wandering the streets. Maybe its worth it, especially if you have children. The rain was apparently caused by an atmospheric river from Hawaii. Though I understand there was a couple tropical storms in the Pacific to provide the moisture. It was very odd how it centered on this town for the majority of its rainfall and then kept creating storms to dump here for the whole day. Very odd. Still, its nice to get clean air. You can see across the valley now, past the Sutter Buttes.

I'm feeling a bit out of sorts, despite the nice weather. The economy up here is really crap. The retired people have what they want and they don't spend much money, so there's few jobs to be had for those tiny trickles. The current president isn't funding much govt spending up here, and with low bidder contracts, those seem to go to people out of town, leaving those of us living here annoyed and frustrated. While I can wax rhapsodic with the best of them, and still love the scenery of my state, the people living here often scare me with their brutality, violence, and lawlessness. Everybody seems to be "I got mine" or "I'm getting mine, get out of my way". There's no inherent respect for others. It's just more of the viciousness of claim jumpers during the Gold Rush. I hardly know what to make of it. I now wonder if the more positive outlook I saw when I moved back up here a year ago was delusion, if it was optimism.

Now that I've read that Men are just as depressed as women, and its considered a disability, does that mean it will be protected like one? Will it become illegal to hire or fire based on "Optimism" since that's discriminatory against Depressed people like me? Hope that happens soon. I'd have way more work opportunities... of course, half the jobs I"m suited for I can't do because they are hiring a skirt, not a pair of pants. I just want to work for sufficient wage to pay a mortgage. Failing that, one that pays the rent long enough to find one that pays a mortgage. Employers that claim they want stable long term employees never pay enough for a mortgage, much less solo-rent. They're discriminating against people like me, who really just want to be left alone. What a pity.