"Affect of Heat" reminds me of Smithy.
He was this super famous doctor in moss world and he looked so old and frail, and always wore bright coloured jumpers which were obviously Christmas presents from his family. He was THE Sphagnum moss guy who dedicated his life to things like micro weather and soil acidity.
This guy, who was a walking library of mosses and ecology, once gave me a glorious 20 for my essay (out of 100, of course) and wrote down a big fat "rubbish" in red on my paper. This guy, who looked like a shrinking retired post office clerk, got semi volcanic mad when someone decided to advocate the theory of wetland forming which did not agree with his own. It was almost bizarre to see him get excited, because he was so old and calm and a little off at his best, and barely noticeable when he was around.
Smithy's lectures were monotonous and quiet and intensely specialized. I don't remember them much for obvious reasons, but I knew I was so blessed to have him as my lecturer, as he was way past his retirement age and was there once a week only for my class. (And he soon completely retired because his wife became unwell.)
So at the beginning of each lecture I looked at his face and started to really listen to his words. He usually turned to the boards within a minute and started scribbling all these Latin names and author names. So, that precious minute was always height of my concentration before I say hello to my dream land.
One day, Smithy stood at the desk, began very slowly and solemnly,
"Just like people get affected by weather to frequent to sex, weather is a major factor to plants' sex life."
I couldn't sleep after that due to the impact of the comment. It was as shocking as finding Santa having Mrs. I was merely shocked by the fact that he was romanticizing... no, more like kinking up mosses by saying this. It was not even true, what he said. Plants sexual cycle is NOT affected by weather but simply, chemically reacting to temperature and humidity and other things. It's not like blanket bog hears Gershwin in hot summer weather in lazy heat, and decides to crack open a bubbly and have sex. They only get up when there is enough temperature and moisture.
That confirmed it. Botanists and gardeners are horny people with very actively kinky minds. One way that's worrying as I have been a hard core gardener since very early age. In another way that would be very cool as, if I get to be old like Smithy; clever, knowledgeable and absolutely boring, and still very sexy in brain that's got to be a great life!
