And so it comes, at last, rain. When I first heard the sound soon after midnight, I mistook it for wind. Stepped outside to gauge how dry, how fast, and instead got wet.

Still raining now, raising the scent of a doused campfire. Watch the news and you'll hear whining about why it's not quite right, this rain - too light, too late, too soon, too hard, whatever the storm, it's somehow going to be wrong.

But this is it, our weather. Rain on the roof and in the hills, and on the ashes of former roofs lying scorched in the smoky hills. Right now, it's what we have. Rain.