That's right — it's a Too Much News Day. When I went to bed at 3:30 AM, it felt like about a quarter of the state was on fire. I woke up at 8:30 to find that another quarter is being evacuated. None of this is anywhere near me but I must know fifty people whose homes are threatened or, in at least one case, gone. I know this is stating the obvious but it's terrible. Just terrible.
So I had to turn the news off. The local stations have had reporters on the scene all night and have pre-empted regular programming. The correspondents are right in the thick of the fires sending back incredible footage and dispensing a lot of valuable information about evacuations, shelters, blocked roads, etc., but I could do without the live "how does it feel to lose everything you own?" interviews. We can kind of assume it isn't a great feel-good moment for most people.
And I have to wonder if those newspeople and their crews aren't getting in the way of the fire fighters. Just before I went to bed, I saw a reporter talking live on camera turn to a passing fire official and ask, "Do you have time to speak with us?" and the official barked back a "No" with the loud subtext of "I can't stop to chat. I have something kind of important to do, you putz!"
Still, he was nicer than Trump talking to any reporter who steadfastly refuses to be his stenographer. That's his definition of Fake News, you know: It doesn't match the way he wants it reported. They stubbornly refuse to write that he beat Hillary in the popular vote and had the most-attended inauguration ever. When he makes his expected nasty comment about how California deserves this, the press will probably screw him over by quoting him accurately.
Trump and the instability that always surrounds him is the other reason there's Too Much News. I think the word "meltdown" is way overused these days, being applied as it is to any sort of disagreement or visible annoyance that can be exploited for YouTube hits…but it's really starting to apply to Trump. I'm thinking that if and when he ever holds another press conference, the news media should drive him completely out of his head by only sending black women to ask questions. So odd to see a man who couldn't say enough nasty things about Barack Obama demanding respect for the presidency.
And as predicted here, the election still isn't completed. And I just got a text alert about the fire that's popped up in Griffith Park saying they may be evacuating the animals in the Los Angeles Zoo. If they had pandas there, I'd call up and offer to house them in my house until this is over but I don't think they have pandas. And I have to stop watching TV because when I do, it's hard to remember that this will all be over. Someday.