Seasonal Scents
S’mores, salty ocean breezes, veggie burgers on the grill, sweaty people on the bus — what’s the smell you associate the most with summer?
Rural areas support large skunk populations. Mostly, they don’t make much trouble. Raiding trash cans and digging up gardens occasionally are usually the limits of their depredations. Unless your dog has an unfortunate encounter, skunks rarely bother us.
Lately though, something is going on in the woods between the skunks and other critters. It’s not our dogs (thank God!), but something is causing them to emit their special perfume. More nights than not, the zephyr breeze carries the delicate scent of skunk to our wrinkling noses.
Garry: “Is that skunk I smell?”
Me: “Yep. Again. Not as close to the house as last time. Somewhere out in the back woods.”
Garry, a passionate believer in room deodorizing spray proceeds to spray the entire area and remarkably, it helps. Of course, almost any other smell is an improvement to “Odeur de Skunk.”
Pepe le Pew would be right at home around here lately. Maybe it’s the coyotes. Or the raccoons or the bobcat. Something is getting the skunks all riled up. I fervently hope they keep the war far from our windows. Because this summer, the scent that dominates, the smell which floats gently on the breeze is absolutely, no missing it, skunk.
Which got me to thinking about stickball. These guys are paid gazillions to play professional baseball. They have parks with groundskeepers, bases, uniforms, baseballs and even bats! How would they do without all that fancy stuff, huh? We didn’t have any of that. No siree.
