siege day 56

Today I heard that the air quality problem in Tucson has been turned over to the solver of tough problems at PDEQ, and he's determined to get to the bottom of it. That would be easier than me getting to the bottom of it, and it'll probably take less time.

But until I get to talk to the man myself, we'll have to settle for some pictures of some wildflowers, so here you go:


Those were up at Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve (up on top of the peninsula) on Wednesday. On Friday I learned that poison oak makes green berries this time of year, which maybe I knew once but had certainly forgotten.


For good measure, here's a picture I kept meaning to share of a grey fox (I think was, anyway) in the most natural environment the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum could cook up. Apparently pink towels are natural enough.


This last one is what happens when there's a botany prof in the house, and one of the other profs needs some female ginkgo branches. Branches on the kitchen floor are par for the course around here -- when my husband brought me here, we were warned not to eat the poison mushrooms in the refrigerator that would be going off to school soon to be shown off to students.

And because I haven't announced anything will kill you for a long, long time, pesticides on food will give your kids ADHD, and the mushrooms in the refrigerator will kill you.