Mercury is in retrograde
Subtitle: Woman plans, god laughs.
I don’t know where to start so I guess I’ll just jump in. People are heading to the moominbeach and other locations on various days by various means of transportation. Automotive vee-hickles are in the shop or may need to be (A/C fixes but not my car (this time) so I’m staying outta that particular fray). I won’t even begin to try to describe the schedule changes that have been going on. If I cannot keep track of them, y’all certainly won’t be able to.
I am not posting a pic today because I don’t have one of the smoke in the yooperland that wouldn’t be stolen from facebook or somewhere. It is smoky in the yooperland. It’s the usual culprit, Canadian wildfires. I am less alarmed than some other people about this although this smoke seems worse than anything in my memory and I know people whose lungs would struggle with the smoke.
Taking the long view (I’ll admit to 72 years), it wasn’t until the last few years that the AQI (Air Quality Index) was reported (it may have been measured earlier). Growing up in the eastern yooperland, I can’t help but wonder how many Canadian wildfires happened when I was a kid (and even a young adult) that we had no clue were happening. Canada is a huge country with large swaths of sparsely populated forest land. I’m sure there were forest fires back then that we never knew about. I’m thinking no one did. They also were not monitoring where the smoke was traveling. Partly because there was no way to do that.
So, I dunno. I don’t want to breathe smoke but my lungs still have high functionality after a lifetime of breathing smoke. Even after two high school boyfriend cigarette smokers and all the years when people smoked cigarettes anywhere and everywhere. I will be fine but I care about our younger generation(s) and so I have packed a bagful of KN95 masks left over from covid. It’s a band aid but it’s kind of all I can do for the moment.
July 15th, 2026 at 11:03 pm
Smoke, darn it! I worry about the air quality and always check it before I do any exercise. I have an air filter for the house as do my daughters. I still remember what Patt’s oncologist told us, “The liver regenerates and is a very forgiving organ. The lungs never forget.” Once damaged, it leads to nothing good. So, I try to urge my children to be very careful about the smoke. I like that you’re packing masks!
July 16th, 2026 at 5:04 pm
I don’t remember smoke as a kid, except for the haze from the freighters. But when Rey was younger and would have asthma on occasion he rarely had it at the cabin. Except one year there was a day or two with wildfire smoke, and out came the inhaler.