Pompeii comes to Vancouver

So Vancouver seems to be degenerating into Armageddon. It's really very freaky. For the past four days we've been suffering under this weird non-shifting fog, which is kind of like the fog that usually surrounds UBC in the morning after it rolls off the ocean, only it's been here for days without a break and shows no sign of abating. You can barely see more than 25m in front of you, and it's damn cold, and driving in it is really not a pleasure. I borrowed someone else's pictures, but this is what it's like here currently.

But the scariest thing was that just now, when I drove downtown to meet Sunshine in a pub, I got off the Granville bridge and suddenly drove into Pompeii. I came around the corner and the entire downtown core around Seymour had no traffic or street lights on. It was completely dark, and extremely foggy, and everywhere there were eerie car lights in the silence, but no other lights. All the cars had to stop at the intersections and let each other through in a random order, because no-one had right of way. And at every intersection there were pedestrians running across the roads so they could cross before the cars came out of the fog and hit them, so there were all these shadows running in front of the car. It was so much like I imagine it being in the midst of Vesuvius erupting, with the ash blinding the air and people running for cover, and darkness. At the same time as it being really rather scary, it was also very surreal and interesting. Luckily I made it through the madness and didn't hit anything, but driving home was equally challenging. I am interested to see what the weather does now, but I'd rather there were no volcanos, or earthquakes, or other such disasters waiting round the corner for us after the fog. Watch this space.