Smoke gets in your eyes

I'm afraid I took this picture myself.

When I look back at this summer during which I was effectively locked out of this blog, I will remember three key things.

The third (I may discuss the other two later) is the relentless spread of wildfires across the province of British Columbia, even to the northern end of Vancouver Island -- an American cousin thought the the Straits of Georgia and Juan de Fuca could shield us. Even if the fires had stayed beyond the water, the skies darkened for days at a time. In the Interior, it was for weeks, and is still a problem from time to time.

For the worst of it, we had an Air Quality Index of 10+, which is worse than Beijing.

I kept the windows closed, and didn't stray far. The air had an orange tinge and a taste that scratched the back of my throat, which reminded me of the August smog in Ottawa before limits on industrial emissions largely cleared the skies about eight years ago.

This song by Kate Bush drifted through my mind, like the smoke outside.



She was singing of nuclear fall-out, but really, how hopeful are the implications of what seems to be becoming an annual event?