There was no wood smoke this evening. But we did have some pretty nasty grass smoke late in the evening. As I have said many times before, if people are not burning wood in this city, they are burning yard waste.
4:00 PM: No wood smoke. Only fresh air like human beings deserve, even if our city council does not think so. 70 degrees, mostly cloudy.
6:30 PM: No wood smoke. Sunny, 73 degrees.
7:30 PM: A very faint trace of some type of smoke is in the air. It is not strong enough to tell what it is.
8:30 PM: A very faint trace of some type of smoke continues. I can easily determine the air is not fresh even if I cannot identify the type of pollutant.
10:40 PM: No wood smoke. The air is fresh.
11:05 PM: Grass smoke. Somebody is burning grass! The grass smoke started out faintly then achieved a light to moderate level within minutes. Grass smoke usually does not get that strong. I do not know who is burning the grass. I stepped outside before it got too strong and looked around and saw nobody nearby burning. There is only one household I know of that burns grass late at night. They do it often. They know grass burning is illegal and they do it under cover of darkness sometimes. Usually, they burn wood and burn their yard waste with it. I am in no mood to drive up to the house to verify it is them when I am getting ready for bed.
The stench of burning grass lasted about 20 minutes. Around 11:30 PM, the air was mostly clear with a faint hint of grass smoke remaining. At midnight, the air was fresh and clear -- as it should be. They have burned grass after midnight before. I am sure they will do it again. We must sleep with the windows closed as always.
Do you want to live in a city like this?