Just when you were loving the heat — rain on the way

I enjoy when it's hot like this in October — probably because the heat comes via the desert winds and a high pressure zone somewhere to the east and north. It's somehow a cleaner, temporary and more forgivable heat than the summer sieges where we bake in our own poisons for weeks. For those who get the itch when the Santa Ana's blow, LAPL librarian and author Glen Creason uploaded to Facebook an apt passage from Raymond Chandler's "Red Wind." I don't know where he got the artwork he matched with today's post, but it seems to fit.

It was one of those hot dry Santa Ana's that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.

Anyway, the news is that the National Weather Service is warning of an abrupt change early this week. A special weather statement from the NWS in Oxnard says that the first winter storm of the season will bring "much cooler temperatures [and] rain and mountain snow to southwest California by midweek." The NWS likes to shout in their statements, and I don't have time to downcase this while thing, so here it is — yes, I believe the weather people are alerting us that temps will fall all the way to (gasp) the 70s. And then to the unthinkable: the 60s with almost a third of an inch of rain.

THIS COLD LOW PRESSURE SYSTEM WILL BRING MUCH COOLER TEMPERATURES TO THE AREA BY MIDWEEK...WITH DAYTIME HIGHS FALLING INTO THE 70S ON TUESDAY AND INTO THE 60S ON WEDNESDAY. THIS STORM ALSO HAS THE POTENTIAL TO BRING MEASURABLE RAINFALL TO THE AREA...ESPECIALLY OVER LOS ANGELES COUNTY AND SOUTHWARD. INCREASING LOW CLOUDS AND DRIZZLE WILL AFFECT THE COAST AND VALLEYS LATE TUESDAY EVENING...PUSHING INLAND TO THE WESTERN COASTAL SLOPES OVERNIGHT. MORE WIDESPREAD LIGHT SHOWERS WILL SPREAD ACROSS THE AREA EARLY WEDNESDAY MORNING AND PERSIST THROUGH EARLY THURSDAY. THE BEST CHANCE OF MEASURABLE PRECIPITATION WILL BE ACROSS LOS ANGELES COUNTY...ESPECIALLY OVER THE SAN GABRIEL MOUNTAINS WHERE AROUND 0.30 INCH OF RAINFALL WILL BE POSSIBLE BY EARLY THURSDAY. THE UNSEASONABLY COLD AIR WILL DROP SNOW LEVELS TO BETWEEN 5000 TO 6000 FEET ACROSS THE REGION WITH LIGHT SNOWFALL POSSIBLE AT THE HIGHER ELEVATIONS WEDNESDAY NIGHT.

And by all means: "LISTEN TO NOAA WEATHER RADIO OR YOUR LOCAL MEDIA FOR THE LATEST UPDATES ON THIS SITUATION."