There are several wildfires in near the coast of North Carolina. Yesterday the winds started blowing gently from the east and carried all of that smoke to the triangle and triad areas. Wednesday night I noticed the moon was a dark orange in the sky and was really surprised how much pollution was in the air until I was reminded of the fires.

Thursday started out OK, but there was a definite odor in the air. Throughout the day the visibility out our windows got worse and worse. I think it got down to 1/2 mile late in the day and the odor hit you strong when you stepped outside. I left my car HVAC on recirculate the entire way home. Even the sun was mostly obscured.

The smoke continues this morning until the winds shift around to blow this stuff out of here. All of this reminds me of the fires in San Diego a few years ago when I flew in there for a conference. Those conditions were MUCH worse as there was ash everywhere. We just have smoke here.

Service guy from Wayne Dalton (makers of the garage door and torsion bar) came out this morning to fix my garage door mechanism. As I suspected, it was the torsion bar. Service guy said the spring was warped inside and had to replace that entire part. Garage door opens and closes beautifully now (I don't think it ever worked that smoothly since I bought this house 10 years ago). Only took him about an hour and total cost was $170--not too bad and service was excellent.