The mountains are missing

 Last Thursday, the mountains disappeared.

Smoke from a huge fire almost 709 miles away moved into town and literally, the mountains vanished. Couldn't see them at all. And, while they aren't Macchu Picchu, these mountains aren't subtle, so for them to just vanish was quite the thing.

Also, how is it that smoke can travel 700 miles and still smell like something is burning?! I am impressed. It's a talent. (Not a fan, but yes, impressed). My friend and I swore that it had to be something local that was burning but nope. We checked multiple news reports and it was not a local fire. It really was just smoke from the west doing a tour. 

The smoke was so bad that we were encouraged not to leave home if we didn't have to. I did leave home, but even having spent a lot of time inside, it was still pretty obvious that there was a problem. 

Today it seems to be clearing up--I can see the mountains again, even though they are still hazy. So that's good. Maybe it will clear up in time for this week's meteor shower. And at least I'm only dealing with smoke. Somewhere, someone has to put up with the fire. And they definitely got the short end of the straw.