Lightning on the water

Last Saturday I looked up and saw rain falling on the ocean at the horizon.  Suddenly, lightning stabbed down from the sky and electrified the ocean.  I grabbed the camera and started counting seconds between flashes to estimate timing till the next bolt.  I almost got lucky with this shot which shows a fading bolt. You'll need to click on the image for the larger version in order to see it.  Soon they were cracking over my head and the thunder was absolutely ear-splitting.  Thinking that the copper-roofed building where I was standing was perhaps not the safest place to seek shelter from the storm, I retreated to a less likely path to ground.  This thunderstorm and it's companions went on to start over 800 fires in California, many of which are still burning. 

sea steps

As I was fixing the stairs down to the sea, the wind caught my sombrero,

and away it sailed, so I repaired my exposed head with a tie-down hat.

Southern path

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

-- Robert Frost

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"When you arrive at a fork in the road, take it."
- Yogi Berra