Yeah, I know. This is incredibly difficult to see. Let me provide some backstory first... Deb and I went out for a drive today. Because we can. We decided to head north, as previously we'd gone mostly south in our excursions. We now know that there's little in the way of a "quick trip" north of us, and will never do it again. Prior to reaching this conclusion, however, we got off the highway at the exit for Red Rock. I've seen some small towns before, and this is not the smallest. For the folks at home, though, this town made Mt. Vision look like a metropolis. (To be fair, though, the only landmark on that map of Mt. Vision is the cemetery. Creepy.)The dust devil wasn't what made us pull over to take pictures. The cool dead tree was. (Not shown, sorry.) As odd as this sounds, we didn't notice the dust devil at first, because it was so big. We've seen them all around, and they're usually small yet dynamic. This one was neither. I've used some photoshop magic to make it more readily apparent (or redly apparent).
That grey line heading up from the mountains is the dust devil. It was big, to say the least.
After we saw the devil, we saw a field full of plants. Had no idea what they were, as they looked completely unfamiliar to both of us. The occasional white flower here and there, but mostly just dark green leaves. Then I saw something white that wasn't a flower, and my brain finally made my mouth say: "cotton!" We had never seen actual cotton plants before, so that was pretty cool. (No, we did not pick any, nor did we have any gin.)
At this point of my rambling, I'd like to point something out. We are now "Arizonans" as well as "Tucsonans". How boring. I want to know who decides the monikers given to state residents. "New Yorker" sounds active (as well as magazine-ish), but "Arizonan" is just... there. I'd rather be an "Arizoner". Sounds like I'm doing something. Same goes for "Tucsonan". Dull. Why not a "Tucsovite"?
3 comments:
I didn't realize there were continental Americans who'd never seen cotton! That's too funny! There's a yearly Cotton Carnival in my neck o' the woods, despite the fact that no one seems happy over having picked the stuff. As a child, I thought it (both the cotton and the carnival) was awesome! My mom would occasionally stop along the side of the road and pick a boll for me. :)
Also, In the photo, what is the squiggly on the right-hand edge? It reminds me of the glyph for Capricorn.
What can I say? We don't get out much. I always thought cotton only grew down south. In Dixie. Look away, look away.
As for the squiggly thing just above the tree stump, those are just the tips of tree branches. I don't really notice them in the first shot, but it's amazing what shows up in an image when you play around with some settings.
Wow, I thought those things only grew underneath my kids' beds.
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