Santa Anna windiness

Yesterday and today have been Santa Anna wind days, when high speed winds blast through Southern California.  Coming from inland, they are generally warm and dry and VERY strong.  Yesterday they created wild and gusty conditions, resulting in lots of damage to power lines, trees etc.  The biggest damage we experienced at our apartment complex was a number of palm fronds in the pool.  Winds reached 130 km an hour apparently, and 400,000 homes lost power.  Flights were diverted from LAX. on Saturday I am heading off to New Mexico to the Chaco Canyon ruins site with Noreen and Jen (two of my graduate students). Although the site is in a desert, it is going to be COLD and probably with showers of snow as well.  Sadly, all my cold weather gear is in the UK, so I am going to spend 3 days whingeing and shivering I suspect.