A few years ago, when I first started spending a fair amount of time in North Carolina, a friend told me about some flowering trees, which she called by a naughty name. The name wasn’t, “frisky,” but I hesitate to put her exact word onto a public blog. The trees bloom in mid-spring, she said, and while they are quite beautiful, their odor is their distinctive characteristic.
She wasn’t kidding, and the frisky trees are in full blossom this week. Technically, they are Pyrus Calleryana Chanticleer, otherwise known as Ornamental Bradford Pear. Why anyone would plant an ornamental fruit tree in the first place is a concept beyond my understanding, and why they would plant trees with such a scent boggles the mind.
How do I describe it without giving offense? A group of us had a fun time in New Zealand recently, providing definitions to slang there that proper ladies would never speak aloud. So maybe I have some practice. Let’s just say that, well, married women would be familiar with the scent. Maybe some (ok, a lot of) unmarried women, too. It comes from men who are very happy. Very very happy.
This morning I did about 100 miles on Miss Elphaba, the R1200R I ride down here in the south. And the frisky trees are in full blossom. The strength of the scent nearly sent me to the ICU!
Just another joke from the south to mess with us Yankees I guess. Given a choice, I’ll keep my Maineiac mud flats thank you very much. At least the clams that grow in their odiferous acres are edible.
1 comment:
I was a Landscape/Horticulture Major at AU in Alabama and it was always a fun joke to answer "C** Tree" on a test in lieu of PC or Bradford Pear, etc. Those trees are great but cannot tolerate a strong wind. Lots of jokes there too, LOL
Lauren
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