Ready... Steady... EVERYBODY TWINKLE!

This was one of those long cool summer evenings; every lawn on my street is freshly mown, and volunteers had weeded the flowerbeds in the little park down the street, and half the neighborhood were out walking their dogs or walking in couples or just walking, and many, many fireflies were gently glowing over all that freshly cut grass. It's good to live in Pennsylvania.

In honor of this suburban bliss, I refer you to Kathryn Cramer's discussion of the importance of sidewalks in the suburbs. She argues that the lack of sidewalks prevents children and therefore families from running around the neighborhood and mingling freely. I think she has a good point, but I also think she underestimates the important role of the Secret Society of Dogwalkers in stringing the neighborhood grapevine.

On a mostly different subject, I had not realized that fireflies are very rarely found in states west of Kansas. I also didn't know that there's a place in the Great Smokey Mountain National Park, near Elkmont, TN, where the fireflies are synchronized! Apparently this is the only known place outside of southeast Asia where this occurs. Elkmont is an 8-hour drive from Pittsburgh; someday I'm going to drive there, and see this.