Thing to be thankful for #1...The smell of fresh cut grass. I was driving to lunch earlier and since it was such a beautiful day, I rolled the window down. I was immediately rewarded with the distinctive aroma of summer. And I couldn't help but think that a year ago today, I was in Pennsylvania and I was probably freezing and all the grass was most likely buried under piles of snow and salt and sand. Isn't California grand?

On a side note, did you know that the wonderful aroma of fresh cut grass is actually a blend of plant defense molecules? Yep, when you cut your grass, it thinks it's being attacked and goes into DefCon 4. And other nearby plants (or blades of grass) can also smell the aroma, and they react to the warning signal. Not that it does them a whole lot of good against your lawn mower. In the grass world, the lawn mower is sort of the nuclear option. Of course, these defenses evolved millions of years before lawn mowers. But at least they smell great.

Posted by Hey Paul   |   Monday, March 27, 2006