Editorial Note: This was written last week. “Yesterday” = “Not Sunday”. Some minor server issues and general laziness kept it from being posted. Everything is still true, though.
I always find myself strangely fascinated this time of year in Georgia—the same way I’d be strangely fascinated driving by a five-car pileup with dismembered bodies lying everywhere. It’s the pollen, you see.
The plants and trees breed with vigor around here. They spew so much pollen into the air that it becomes rather ridiculous. According to the Atlanta Allergy & Asthma Clinic, the following scale of severity applies to the number of pollen particles per cubic meter:
0-30 = Low 31-60 = Moderate 61-120 = High 120+ = Extremely High
Now have a gander at this image. Check out those red blocks representing this week in April.
As I tweeted the other day, once you get one full order of magnitude above “Extremely High” it’s probably ok to stop counting, go home and have a beer.
You may notice a sharp drop off from Thursday to Friday on the pollen count (from Extremely High x 45 to only Extremely High x 16) which was due to some massive rain showers we had yesterday. Alas, I was hoping for something in the Extremely High x 8, but obviously we didn’t get it. </sarcasm>
It’s a good thing I don’t have allergies. Unfortunately a lot of the people I hang with (like my wife) do. I feel for them this time of year.
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