Stinkhorns, what else?

Here is my friend's 9-5-08 photo of a stinkhorn in her yard. It is her best photo yet!

I had to shrink it because I don't have much space on my blog, so just know that the original photo is much better -- you can really see the mushroom glistening. Scandalous!I really hope that she submits her photo to the Stinkhorn Hall of Fame. She and her husband agreed that the smell is like dirty socks/dog poop/rotting flesh.

My husband and I stopped by the aforementioned friend's yard after work today. We knew that any stinkhorn we saw this late in the day would be shriveled, but we just had to give it a try. We saw a couple of them that had shriveled and fallen over, but it was still nice to see them, and to see that the flies were still interested in them. Even though they are fairly small, I spotted one from the car. My friend wasn't at home, but she had marked the location with a stick and had drawn a map of her yard indicating the blessed location. She said that we could try pouring water on the mushroom to try to reconstitute it. We tried that. It didn't work, but I'll bet her neighbors were wondering about the strangers standing in her yard, staring intently at the mulch, and pouring water on it.

After that, we went out for crepes and returned home. Well, I'm going to bed early. I have a bad headache, and neither prescription decongestant, nor Advil, nor nasal moistening gel are having an effect on it. Oy vey. The weather is changing (it was cool and windy today), and I've found that changes in barometric pressure really mess with my sinuses, inner ear, etc.

Good night,
Sylvie