The Daily: 4 August 2025

Another fun week in paradise…

The smoke has been officially “unhealthy” several times in the last thirteen days and has spent most of that time merely at “unhealthy for sensitive groups”. Temperatures hit 90°F several of those days, with lows only in the 70s, so… not cool enough to cool down the house overnight without the air conditioner and fans running, even if the windows could be open. There has been rain, but it’s not clearing out the smoke. It has also not been regular enough to keep the garden watered. It falls in brief, hard downpours that can dump over a half inch of rain in less than an hour (once it was an inch in about twenty minutes). But then days of heat dry up whatever the soil has captured of the downpour. I’ve had to water the raised beds every couple days — which is not normal for this time of year. Nor is that something I should be doing while in recovery from meningitis…

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Then there was a panic attack on Wednesday. A magnitude 8.8 earthquake, the sixth largest in recorded history, hit just offshore of Kamchatka Peninsula, followed by an eruption of the Klyuchevskoy volcano. This was not an isolated event on the Pacific Ring of Fire. Not quite ten days before this very strong earthquake, Kamchatka also experienced a 7.4 magnitude quake — which is strong for the rest of the world, but a moderate strength for very active Kamchatka. (Remember: the scale on earthquake strength is logarithmic; 8.8 is more than ten times more powerful than 7.4.) Looking further around the Ring, four weeks ago an enormous earthquake swarm hit Mt Rainier, the largest swarm ever recorded on that volcano. None of these quakes were strong enough to be much felt at the surface, but the concentration was alarming, with hundreds of quakes in the initial swarm and over a thousand aftershocks that were still being recorded more than twenty days later.

Volcanologists are getting excited… that always means bad things…

In any case, the Kamchatka quake set off tsunamis and triggered warnings and evacuations as far away as Chile. One of my sisters lives on an island near Seattle, a fairly unobstructed line across the ocean from the quake’s epicenter. I spent most of Wednesday obsessively checking message boards, monitoring the waves and the aftershocks (which are also waves, but in rock).

Fortunately, the ocean waves were not large (though some of the aftershocks were) except in the remoter parts of Kamchatka, where waves up to 6 meters were observed. It’s thought that some parts of the peninsula’s coast may have seen a wall of water 10-15 meters high. Vasily Titov, a scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, theorized that a wave of up to 43 meters may have washed over the uninhabited coastline nearest the epicenter. Still, tsunami warnings were lifted by late afternoon, and the evacuated portions of Hawaii and the American continental coasts were cleared for return. However, it was stressed that there will still be erratic currents and strong waves for several days to come as water continues to slosh around the Pacific basin. There is also the possibility of a stronger quake to follow, though, since this seems to be the second major release of tension along this particular fault in the subduction zone in as many weeks, another strong quake seems unlikely.

On this part of the subduction zone…

And that qualification is what is worrying me. The north Pacific Rim subduction zone seems to be rather bouncy these days… Even before the Mt Rainier mega-swarm event, there was a steady trickle of mildly disturbing news out of the Cascades Volcano Observatory. Observations seem to indicate an upsurge in activity there. (Or at least the volcanologists are getting excited.) It all adds up rather alarmingly… A huge swarm of quakes, indicating the movement of fluid beneath the volcano, followed by a major quake and then an even more major quake in tandem with an eruption… This all sounds very much like there is substantial shifting of the North American plate over the Pacific plate, with a concomitant increase in pressure that will be released in the form of more quakes and, more terrifyingly, more eruptions.

It’s one thing for volcanoes on sparsely populated and somewhat barren Kamchatka to erupt. An eruption in the Cascades — like, for example, at Mt Rainier — is quite a different proposition. Not only are there more humans affected, but there is more everything affected. Also, the kind of eruption will be different. Kamchatka has a relatively basaltic composition magma. This chemistry allows it to degas, releasing pressure within the body of magma as it rises to the surface. Klyuchevskoy sent out a powerful eruption on July 30th, but it didn’t blow up.

Cascades volcanoes blow up.

The Cascades volcanoes, resting on a thicker slab of silica-rich continental crust than Kamchatka, have a stickier chemical composition that traps the superheated fluids coming off the subducting plate. As the magma travels to the surface, pressure on the magmatic body lessens. If this happens quickly enough, either through strong melt generation at the subducting plate’s surface or through new fissures in surrounding rocks (like those that develop in an earthquake), then the superheated fluids trapped in the magma, being at very high relative pressure, will explode. This is why Mt St Helens is a crater.

This is the future of Mt Rainier. And Mt Hood. And a frightening number of Mounts all along the Pacific Northwest coast.

But right now, I am worried about Mt Rainier. It is stirring. There will be an eruption. And when it blows — not if — the pyroclastic flows will destroy dozens of communities downslope to the west and southwest of the peak. The associated earthquakes will generate waves that may inundate coasts and islands as far away as the Aleutians. Depending on the wind that day, Tacoma and Seattle may be buried in hot ash. In the best possible scenario, thousands of people will be displaced, and many dozens of square miles will be wiped clean of all life forms.

And did I mention that my sister lives there…

So I am fretful, wondering why humans have been violating this one cardinal law of development for thousands of years… Don’t build next to a smoking volcano… Seems simple enough to me.

We seem to think that because it hasn’t erupted in our piddling lifespan, it’s not going to erupt any time soon — because we just can’t internalize geologic time. So, no matter how many times it is shown to be ridiculously dangerous, we build our homes and cities right on the slopes. Because it’s pretty… But, folks, a volcano that last erupted 3000 years ago is still an active volcano. It will erupt again. Maybe yet in your lifetime… And there is no way to predict when that will happen, except to neurotically keep watch on the dozing beast, marking its every grumble and feeding data into models that might, might, tell us what to expect tomorrow… if any number of known unknowns don’t come into play and the volcano steers clear of unknown unknowns… which is asking quite a lot of reality…

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And then there’s the smoke. Thursday evening and into Friday morning, Chicago, IL, was briefly at the top of the list of worst air quality in the world with an air quality index of 174. By lunchtime, it slipped to number three behind Kinshasa and… Minneapolis, MN… Which should tell you something about the source of the world’s worst pollution right now.

(For the record, my town has seen air quality indices as high as the top three on Friday multiple times this summer… We’ve briefly hit the 160s and 170s more than once just in the last couple weeks… So this list of most polluted cities seems to be just counting cities…)

Canada is experiencing its second worst wildfire year on record, after 2023. Here is what last Friday looked like…

Most of the fires are far to the northwest, distant even from Minneapolis. But, the jet stream can move particulates at great speed over the entire globe. On average, air moves over North America from west to east with a bump to the north somewhere around Montana. This week the fires themselves were driving that bump far north. Think of the heat off the fires working like a vacuum (because it does — hot air flows toward cold, leaving behind a vacuum to be filled… this is how convection works). Air moving across the continent was pulled rather gently north toward the hot fires. But once it passed the belt-line of the worst of the fires (compare maps below and above), it was pulled back to the fast-moving jet stream. The end result was that smoke was on a conveyor belt from Alberta and Saskatchewan headed straight to the US Midwest.

But it was also personal… The jet stream in summer always flows strong over the US Northeast. This means that surface wind is from the west(ish) in central Vermont. On Friday, the stream dipped a little south after its trip to Canada, and then it turned north again. It also seems to have been compressed and funneled between flow from Arctic and the tropics. As you can see from the map above, the flow speeded up substantially as it moved over the Great Lakes, rushing all that smoke that was choking Midwesterners straight to New England. Fortunately, that very strong flow in the upper atmosphere probably kept most of the smoke aloft as it headed for Iceland. But we got a good blanket… To add to what we already had.

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Saturday morning started out tolerably breathable and with lovely temperatures and a light breeze once the fog lifted — so I opened up the house to clear out the stuffy heat. By mid-morning, the air quality was getting dodgy again, but not enough to close up the house. Which I came to regret…

My oven died on Saturday. Because, of course, it would die on a Saturday Lammas, one of only a handful of these bread-themed festivals in my memory when I was off work and temperatures were comfortable for baking. So I had planned a day of corn muffins and sourdough after I made the week’s yogurt. Luckily, I didn’t follow my usual routine of mixing up the bread dough while I was heating the yogurt milk. Because when I went to get the yogurt jar out of the oven where it should have been heated to 250°F for 30 minutes, the oven was barely warmer than the kitchen (which was cool enough for me to don a sweatshirt). So there would be no baking until the oven was sorted…

First, I thought the wonky dial was to blame, but it did turn on the element. I could see the element was a bit red, like it had been on and was cooling down. So then I thought the element had died. But the top heating element for the broiler did the same thing, turned on just enough to be slightly warm, but not, you know, broiling. I can understand wearing out the bottom element because I use it all the time. But I never use the broiler. So I couldn’t have burnt that out. Now, this was an old range. It may not have been used daily (or even weekly?) before I bought the house, but it still had decades of use on it. In my experience, it never has heated evenly or held at temperature. So I knew it would die soonish. I had even looked into proactively replacing the element. (Nothing doing… I can’t even find that model of range, never mind a functioning part that would fit it…) 

The range-top heating elements were similarly ailing. Two would not stay at the temperature level indicated on the knob, gradually drifting cooler until I reminded them where they should be by turning them off and then back on. (Made simmering things a bit of a challenge.) Also the light that indicates a warm cook surface was permanently on. Disturbingly, I could get it to shut off if I banged on the surface… But I am not good enough with electronics to rewire what was obviously something crossed. Also, the cook surface glass lid does not lift up anymore… No idea why, but it won’t budge. It doesn’t even feel like it should budge. There is no give to it at all. So I couldn’t get to the light — or the elements — even if I felt up to that task.

Finally, the clock, an adorable analog thing with actual hands, was also electronically challenged. It too seems like it should pop out so that you can change the time, but it won’t budge. And it’s been wrong since I moved in. But variably wrong. Some days, it’s twenty minutes fast, sometimes, eight hours slow. It’s not measuring Earth time. (And no, I haven’t sat with it enough to know what units it is measuring… though I was tempted by that project… being a numbers nerd…)

In short, it had too many electronic demons for me to exorcise. And because it is so old and apparently not a very common model even for the 1980s or 90s when it was made, it is probably unrepairable because the parts simply don’t exist. Even if whatever is sealing the top can be broken without destroying the range. Which is not a given…

So, I set about replacing it tout suite. Only…

The range is small. A bit over 44 inches high at the back and not quite 30 inches wide. And there is no wiggle room (another repair — and cleaning — challenge as this tight fit makes it VERY difficult to move). Also, there is a cute, but sort of DIY-cheap shelf installed above the range with scrolled shelf brackets screwed into the tile on the wall. Actually, they look to be screwed into the mortar with a bit of backfill, so they were probably installed at the same time as the tile work (which is also adorably wonky DIY). These brackets are barely wider than the current range, and the bottom scroll is a bit under 46 inches off the ground.

Let me just say that there are no ranges made in that size now. The replacement project became quite involved. Had to take very careful measurements. And then, because I couldn’t quite trust any numbers online (because no two vendors ever agreed on dimensions at that degree of precision), I had to take myself off to Home Depot up in Burlington to measure things that were in stock up there.

(I would like to take a short detour here to explain why Home Depot and not local… I could not find one local company that had an online inventory. Only one was open on Saturday. None delivered on Saturday. So I could not see the inventory, could not shop the floor, and would not be able to take delivery… because I work… This is, unfortunately, a very common problem with local businesses in Vermont. You can’t bank on the weekends. You can’t get a plumber or an electrician. Even public services like the libraries have no weekend hours and are closed by 6pm on weekdays. It is something that probably needs to change if we want a local economy. That, or working people need more flexible schedules so that they can do what needs to be done. Never mind being able to do much else like volunteer or join a book club or what-have-you…)

(Also Son#1 did work for Home Depot for over ten years… and he has cerebral palsy… so I have a certain personal fondness for the company… they stood by him… and that is NOT usual…)

By the time I finally determined that I would need to make the drive, the skies had started to look dark. I thought it had clouded over. It had not… There were no clouds whatsoever. And it was breezy with low humidity. The dimmed sun was just smoke.

Now, in leaving the house open, I was not a complete ninny. I left the sheer curtains closed, mostly to keep the sun out (which negates the whole “leave the house open to cool it off” thing anyway…). But those sheers also act like a face mask for my house; they filter out the particulates in the air pretty well. So indoors was not smoky when I left. In fact, so intent was I on the range replacement project (and on remembering how to get to Home Depot), that I really didn’t notice the smoke outside until after I was on the road. It was also not as bad where I live as it was just to the west… where the wind was blowing from… 

Just a few miles up the highway I had to dig out the face mask. The smoke was so thick that normally expansive views from the tops of mountain passes were opaque. You couldn’t see from one hill to the next. The valley flats were blanketed in ocher fog, enough that cars without their lights on were difficult to see. And it smelled like acrid wood smoke, like ash, like there was a fire just over there and not a couple thousand miles away.

I was not the only person driving masked, though I was in a decided minority at Home Depot. I shed the mask indoors, but I could still smell the smoke drifting in through the doors. 

In the end, I did find a range that will probably fit. (If not, I’ll improvise. I’m not above cutting off those damned shelf bracket scrolls…) I suppose I should be grateful that the old one died when it did. I got a new one on deep discount, perhaps the last time that will be possible after tariffs go into effect this week… Which also will affect even the possibility of buying new and will probably entirely shut down the manufacturing of replacement parts… So what exists now on the showroom floor is what will be available — at much increased cost — for the foreseeable future… if not forever…

Anyway, business concluded, I turned around and drove back home…

In that maybe two hours of driving and measuring appliances and putting in an order (which last takes a rather unreasonable amount of time, in my opinion…), the breeze had carried the smoke over my town and and off to places east. And because my town is in a hole, surrounded by mountains, once the smoke found its way in, it stayed. (It’s still here…)

It was the weirdest light. There was not a cloud in the sky, but it was as dim as though the sun was in partial eclipse. For hours. The air was not as brownish-grey as images from Chicago and Minneapolis, but it was definitely pushing fuzzy sepia. Then the sun went down as a wine red ball on the horizon. I have seen this happen in high humidity, but never on a dry, breezy day with no clouds in the sky.

But back to my regrets… the curtains were fine at filtering out modest amounts of smoke. They were wholly unequal to an air quality index that measured around 150. (Why do no two sources ever agree on that…) I was kind of surprised that the smoke alarms weren’t triggered. (Maybe need to look into that?…) I left the mask on for quite a while as I pointed fans in a couple upper level windows outward, closed all the lower windows, and sucked out as much air as possible. By 9pm, I felt like the worst was ventilated, so I closed up the house the rest of the way. 

Still slept badly. My throat and eyes still felt gravelly well into Sunday. And the house still carries a faint whiff of ash, which probably won’t go away until I launder the curtains… which isn’t happening soon. For one thing, it would be useless to wash them and hang them out to dry in this continuing pall… 

Meanwhile, the garden tasks remain undone, including carrying water across the street. Which, I figure, is right out while I am still recovering from neuro-hell. So I am worried about the veg. But not worried enough to do anything that might cause me to miss work…

Because another fun effect of late capitalism — or maybe capitalism in general — is that the neuro-hell ate up all my allowed time off. I qualify for unpaid medical leave, so I will be able to buy back the time that was counted as paid leave, to the tune of about $2000 which I do not have… But I haven’t done that yet, and I have zero time off right now. It has been made known under no uncertain terms that I will be fired if I miss any more work days because of paltry excuses like inflammation of the spinal membranes… To pile on to that… I could put in for short-term disability to get back some of the $2000. Only, the rules on that mean I would only be able to reclaim about $500. Which, ok, that’s still money… but to qualify for that I have to surrender an invasive level of rights to my personal information to a third-party company that makes no secret of its extensive use of that data mining… not all of which would be relevant to my claim… I don’t really feel that’s worth $500.

I am looking for another job. 

I was already annoyed. In fact, I probably have an airtight age and gender discrimination case against my employer right now, as they hired a young male with far less experience at working (I’ve been working longer than he’s been alive) from outside the corporation (so he knows nothing about any of our systems) to fill a job that I had interviewed for and thought was sort of in the bag as a logical promotion. But I lack a penis. I am old and unimpressionable. And, I suspect there might also be elements of my daddy doesn’t play golf with upper management… But I digress…

As to buying back the “combined time off”, I will have to put that on a credit card. Expenses are eating up my wages right now. I just bought my winter heating oil, at summer oil rates, but still expensive. Electricity use has been rather high with the air conditioner and fans running so much. Food is just ridiculous. Even with the veg I am eating out of the garden, it is not unusual to spend almost $250 every time I go to the grocery store. I go three to four times a month, so I’m averaging about $800 per month on groceries. For one person! Plus another $100 or so for my cat’s needs and for maintenance drug prescriptions. And, of course, now I get to pay for another round of medical expenses, most of which were worthless… 

And just to add on to that tale of woe… the Corporation for Public Broadcasting announced on Friday that it will be shutting down, thanks to our dear dipshit-in-chief. Ex works for PBS. I am unclear on whether the station he runs will be able to keep going solely funded by its donations and foundation… Probably not. Certainly not without deep cuts in costs… Ex also pays most of the student loans the boys incurred… I am unclear on how that is going to work out also, but I suspect I may need to contribute… Finally, I need to get Ex off my mortgage next year, per our divorce decree. So I need to qualify for a loan on my house with just my own income. Which I am fairly sure does not qualify for a mortgage on my house. Which is partly why I put in for the promotion. (That, and it’s a job I am better suited to emotionally and experientially…) (And yes, my employers knew that I need more income… and they still chose to hire a kid less than two years out of college over promoting me… they will, nevertheless, be so surprised, I am sure, when I put in my two weeks… because they are that blind…)

So that’s the news for this week… another fun day in paradise…

Let me just conclude with my usual coda… This latest recount of another week in late capitalism is not an anomalous tale of woe… I am not unusual. If anything, I am doing better than average. This is everyone. The details vary, but we all have this story. In fact, this week, the details are probably about the same, as we all are similarly affected by volcanoes and tariffs and smoke and increasing costs of being alive… which generally unquestioned phrase, itself, is a symptom of our malady… Living does not cost anything. We don’t owe capitalism our time and wages, our lives. To the contrary, capitalism owes us for all it has stolen from us… We all are suffering under this monster parasite. And all of that suffering is due to the monster, not to anything specific in any given life. 

You have just as much woe as I do… Add it up… Compare it to your friends… And then get angry!

Because this ain’t paradise…

Cheers…

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©Elizabeth Anker 2025