I just got home from a 10 mile bike ride. I had planned on 20 miles, but I couldn't breath. My chest is tight and I feel oxygen starved. It's the smoke.
The sky is hazy again from the smoke blowing down from Georgia. It's not so thick at ground level that you can tell it's there, or even really smell it, but it's there just the same. After about 5 miles I was having a hard time breathing and my eyes were stinging.
Clean air is something we tend to take for granted unless we live some place like LA where smog is a daily fact of life. For most of us we just expect the air to be breathable and not filled with microscopic ash particles. By the time I made it back to the house I was dearly missing the nice clean air we normally have here.
I think I've pretty much coughed out all of the ash particles by now, or at least enough of it that I feel like I can breath again. Thank God for air conditioning and the air filtering they provide.
I think I'll remain indoors the rest of the day unless it rains and washes the crap out of the air.