It was chilly, but sunny on the day that I moved exceptionally heavy but only-moderately-radioactive things from one place to another. It was a chilly but sunny day when—after moving bulky things—that I met a sprawling colony of off-green, flamboyant symbionts. It was a chilly, but sunny day like many chilly but sunny days, spent moving only-moderately-radioactive tools of the dental trade. As is my custom of such days, I fought boredom with my camera and thoughts of violence and mayhem, usually in the form of exceptionally dramatic natural disasters, or improbably large, fire-breathing reptiles with Japanese names and a penchant for kicking concrete buildings into dramatic clouds of powder. Such pleasant thoughts were instantly derailed when I leaned against a tree in order to steal a few surreptitious drags from half a cigarette. I’d chosen a not-so-trendy tree for my smoke break. Judging by the amount of bark-front real-estate occupied by massive lichen colonies, the tree a few steps to my left was the trendy tree and every self-respecting lichen wanted to be there. Judging by the tree itself—I couldn’t see the bark—every self-respecting lichen already lived there. The tree was not only coated in lichen growth, but the lichens themselves were coated in lichen growth. I don’t really know if I saw a tree, or something more interesting: a tree-shaped fractal made up of reproductively active lichens. At any rate, I’d decided to smoke under one of the less popular trees bordering a rather unpopular parking lot. Were I a lichen I’d have known better. As I had my camera with me, I decided to nab a few shots of lichen growth. As a science fiction writer, I love these things. They’re truly alien. They’re composite organisms. Some lichen breeds are a combination of cyanobacteria and fungi living in perfect balance. The more traditionally green breeds of lichen tend to be various algae and fungi living in equally perfect balance. The essential quality of any lichen is the whole bacteria/algae-to-fungus ratio, and the most flagrantly successful members of the species were just a few feet to my left. I nabbed dozens of shots and was pleased that most of them came out. This is the best of them, and as it’s now a grotty, wet, and generally soggy day, I rather like the visual reference (here) to a warmer, sunnier, slightly-more-radioactive day. Well…I could do without the negligible amounts of radiation, but still, but perhaps miniscule amounts of radioactive decay led to the nice feeling of warmth I enjoyed before losing myself in fits of appreciation over lichens going to spore. I don’t think there’ll be a lichen series, at least not yet, but I’m glad that there’s at least one lichen shot in my gallery. Hopefully you like it too. As always, thank you for viewing, reading, and commenting, and I hope you’re all having a less soggy, less rainy, warmer day than today has proven to be. Ah, but this is April, nonetheless, and as the old adage goes: April showers bring May mosquitoes…so all is in good order, I suppose.