Needless to say, this has been an unprecedented summer. COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on just about everything and everyone. Now, as summer winds down, we face an equally unprecedented and indefinite fall and winter.
This week would have been the opening of the Canadian National Exhibition: the true harbinger of the end of summer.
Before summer ends, be sure to enjoy whatever summer experiences you can, before it is too late.
For example, earlier this week, I learned that the corpse flower was in bloom at the Metro Zoo. Nicknamed “Pablo ‘Pe-ew’caso”, the Zoo’s specimens of the corpse flower, or amorphophallus titanium, also known as the titan arum, blooms for only a short time (8 to 36 hours) every year. The plant usually doesn’t bloom for the first 7 to 10 years of its life, and thereafter may only bloom every few years. The plant can reach a height of over 3 m. The plant attracts bugs for pollination by giving off the smell of rotting meat or a rotting corpse, hence the common name. The red colour of the flower contributes to the illusion of meat.
A time-lapse video of the plant blooming can be found here.
Alas, I was too late, and missed it.
Make the most of the rest of your summer. Enjoy an Ontario peach. It is going to be a long, long fall and winter.
Thanks for reading.