This is so awesome — the same weather that created mudslides in the west and dumped massive amounts of snow to the Southwest has brought three times the normal rainfall to the deserts of southern California, and as a result, Death Valley is blooming. The New York Times travel section has a good story about it; if you’re interested, you should probably read it soon, since the link will almost assuredly take you to the pay-per-view archives in the not-too-distant future.