A small room inside a bay window. A single bed, a table and chair, and a sink. I could manage something larger, with more conveniences, but I could never match the view.

The rains are hard and at times sound like poured gravel. The radio host I wake up to talks in nervous tones of waves pounding the southern suburbs. 

"El Niño," he keeps saying, "a cycle of warm and cold air."

The cause of this oscillation is still under study.

Another load of gravel. I roll over and think not of sheep but of sandbags.