On the way to the hardware store, for tension rods to curtain off the weensy non-opening-yet-white-hot-heat-admitting parlour windows, I had to swerve to avoid hitting a parrot. It was huge, with deep greyish blue plumage, and lay face down, wings folded neatly, in the middle of the road amidst the hundreds of branchlets, seedlings, and untethered yard equipment that have taken over the Berkeley landscape.

The backyard is like a broken [foliage-filled] snowglobe, now, and the city smells like deadly dry heat. The neighbors are all shouting over the sirens. Me, I just quietly hosed down the jasmine and canas and pride of madeira, and made sure the leaf litter was too soggy to ignite.