7:00 PM: Gorgeous evening. Sunny, nice breeze, 80 degrees. And wouldn't you know, someone is burning wood. Not grill smoke, not cooking of food, burning wood. Wood smoke is wafting in on the breeze right up to my nose and into my lungs!
Prior to this time I was out on the deck enjoying the beautiful evening. The smell of lilacs and blossoms filled the air. So delightful! Until some inconsiderate ass started burning wood! What would you rather smell? Lilacs, or wood smoke? In this city, you will always smell wood smoke!!!!!! You have no choice in North St. Paul. The wonderful aroma of lilacs was obliterated by wood smoke! The blossoms will be gone in two or three weeks. The window of opportunity to enjoy them is small. But we get to breathe wood smoke almost every day the weather is nice!
By now I've made it clear how much I hate breathing wood smoke. So I came inside. My evening ruined yet again by wood smoke! The wood smoke was light, carried on the breeze. But I know this city. I know it is only going to get stronger as the evening wears on. Given how gorgeous this evening is, the wood smoke will probably be very heavy.
Every damn day somebody is burning wood when the weather is nice. Every f- day! You cannot enjoy a single day in this damn town without breathing wood smoke! Read my entries from 2008 on this blog and you will see that almost every day we had to endure the hell of wood smoke pollution last year. This year isn't much different.
The city government put in the generous recreational burning ordinance that allows 7 hours of burning per day, 7 days per week, each and every day of the year. Believe me, people use much of that allowed time, and burn frequently outside the allowed time, if they don't just let their fires smolder all night long, which occurs often.
I've been paying attention to city hall for almost a year now. In that time an internet system was proposed that would have put the city deep in debt. A small wind turbine is being built that will only power 110 homes at peak capacity, a level that will seldom be reached (good idea, but too costly to justify the power output). The city council is devoting time and energy to grand projects that the city does not need but they have done nothing about the wood smoke pollution we are forced to breathe on a daily basis.
I think the city leaders should reconsider their priorities and focus more on the issues that make the city uninhabitable. Issues like wood smoke pollution, for example. I have spoken to elderly citizens of this city, some of whom have lived here for 40 or 50 years. Many of them plan on dying here. Do you, dear city leaders, think those elderly residents want to breathe wood smoke each and every day for the duration of their lives? Or would they rather smell the lilacs?
8:00 PM: No wood smoke at this time. Wind is coming from a different direction. Was coming from the south before. Still early.
Note: I noticed several visitors finding this blog searching Google using the phrase "city of North St. Paul". So I searched Google using those words and see that at this time this blog is in the third position of the search results. Only the official city website is positioned higher in both the first and second positions. This means that more people will be finding this blog. More attention will be drawn to this issue.
8:30 PM: Wood smoke is back. Light to moderate wood smoke at this time. You can really smell the wood smoke outside. It isn't so strong as to burn your sinuses. But hey, who wants to breathe smoky air even if it is only mildly smoky? Not me. Not most people.
9:30 PM: Wood smoke is gone at this time. This was the last check of the air quality this evening.
Overall, this evening was not nearly as smoky as I thought it would be. It was not without wood smoke, as every evening should be. The wood smoke wasn't strong because nobody near me was burning. As I have written numerous times, wood smoke can travel a great distance. It does not need to be a nearby neighbor with a bonfire to smoke up your neighborhood. The burner can be half a mile a way or more and your neighborhood will be filled with smoke if the wind pattern is right.