Breathing Free While Dallas/Fort Worth Has A Level Orange Ozone Action Day

Today my previous Texas location is having itself a Level Orange Ozone Action Day.

My current location is about 120 miles northwest of my old location.

Apparently 120 miles is distant enough to escape the extreme pollution that pollutes the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.

I am looking out my computer room window, right now, at a horizon which has no haze.

Clear blue sky.

I have now been out of the D/FW Metro Mess for almost two months.

Long enough to make note of some interesting changes.

When I lived in Western Washington I never had any allergy woes. Or breathing woes. After my exile to Texas I soon developed various breathing woes. As in clogged up nasal passages which soon had me using nasal spray addictively.

I also had several bouts of extreme allergic reaction to allergens, like pollen blowing in from Hill Country.

And then there's the D/FW dust.

I have a glass topped coffee table that made the move from Washington. At my location in Washington that glass topped coffee table never got dust covered. Soon upon arriving in Texas I found that I was constantly removing the coating of dirty dust from that glass.

I figured my Washington location must have been dust free due to its negative ionizer air filter.

Well, that same glass covered coffee table is at my new location in Wichita Falls. And it is totally dust free after being here almost two months.

Same thing with the water here. At my previous Texas location something in the water was always making a scale like coating. The stainless steel kitchen sink was a challenge to keep shiny. Same with the shower curtain.

Here the water does not leave behind any sort of residue. What are the water treaters doing different here in Wichita Falls which has the water being so much, I don't know, cleaner?

I don't think the D/FW zone is a healthy place to be living, for a number or reasons. That may be true of many highly populated urban zones.

But, I think D/FW, and Fort Worth in particular, may be much worse than the urban norm. Fort Worth is the only large city in the world which has allowed fracking on a massive scale. Fracking puts all sorts of bad stuff in the air. Lots of dust due to trucks. Lots of noise when drilling. Lots of chemicals during the fracking. Lots of air pollutants when the gas is extracted.

Too bad there is not some sort of environmental protection agency monitoring the air we breathe and stopping the worst of the polluters from polluting...

I Finally Realized I Have Been Stupidly Exposing My Allergy Prone Self To Texas Ozone Air Pollution

Occasionally I really amaze myself with how cluelessly dumb I can be. Really, it's true. Years ago, if I remember right, someone somewhere told me that they thought me to be really smart. Witty, smart and highly intelligent.

Well.

I know myself better than I know anyone else. I may be a bit witty, at times, but smart and highly intelligent? Not so much.

Example of my clueless dumbness.

For weeks now I have been whining about my allergic woes. I do this whining at the same time I mention going hiking or biking under the noon day sun.

Friday night I basically was unable to sleep, so miserable and clogged up was I from my allergic woes.

The next day, that being yesterday, as in Saturday, a light bulb finally turned on in my dim bulb, oxygen deprived brain.

At the same time that those who monitor such things inform me via various means that the air that I am breathing is polluted, I go out in it at the worst time of the day.

And then wonder why I have allergic woes.

Below is today's AIR QUALITY ALERT from the National Weather Service...

...AIR POLLUTION WATCH LEVEL ORANGE... 

AIR POLLUTION WATCH - LEVEL ORANGE - FOR DALLAS-FORT WORTH.

THE TEXAS COMMISSION ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY (TCEQ) HAS ISSUED A LEVEL ORANGE AIR POLLUTION WATCH FOR THE DALLAS-FORT WORTH AREA FOR SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2012.

ATMOSPHERIC CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED TO BE FAVORABLE FOR PRODUCING HIGH LEVELS OF OZONE AIR POLLUTION IN THE DALLAS-FORT WORTH AREA ON SUNDAY. OZONE LEVELS COULD REACH THE LEVEL ORANGE "UNHEALTHY FOR SENSITIVE GROUPS" CATEGORY.

ELEVATED CONCENTRATIONS OF OZONE CAN ACT AS A LUNG IRRITANT. INDIVIDUALS WITH CHRONIC LUNG DISEASE, SUCH AS ASTHMA AND EMPHYSEMA, AS WELL AS THE ELDERLY AND YOUNG CHILDREN, ARE PARTICULARLY SENSITIVE TO OZONE AND SHOULD ATTEMPT TO AVOID EXPOSURE. TO AVOID EXPOSURE, MINIMIZE EXERTION OUTDOORS DURING THE MID-DAY TO EARLY EVENING HOURS OR STAY INDOORS IN AN AIR- CONDITIONED ROOM DURING THIS TIME.

Clearly I have been in denial. Somehow thinking I am impervious to the threat posed by the air that I breathe. Also in denial that I am borderline being in that ELDERLY group the National Weather Service indicates has an increased vulnerability to Ozone.

So, from this day forth, there shall be no more noon day aerobic exercising, by me, in the outer world at my polluted location on the planet, until the National Weather Service indicates that the air that I'd be breathing in that outer world is no threat to my respiratory system.

I will continue to go swimming though. In the morning. Which I will do today, Sunday, the second Fall morning of 2012, as soon as the sun arrives to light up this forsaken, polluted place I call home.

Dallas/Fort Worth Level Orange Ozone Alert & Yellow Wildflowers

Despite being under a Level Orange Air Ozone Alert here in Fort Worth, I decided to risk doing damage to my lungs and other vital organs by going hiking at the Tandy Hills Natural Area at noon.

That's the noon view of beautiful downtown Fort Worth's stunning skyline. The air does not look very dirty, to me, in Ol' Dirty Town, today. Maybe it's invisible air pollution.

The Tandy Hills wildflowers seem to have had a resurgence, there was a lot of color on the ground today, including a big yellow flower that looked sort of sunflower/daisy-like.

Today whilst hiking it occurred to me that the Prairie Fest powers that be should have an Easter Egg Hunt during the Fest. With eggs on the trails, only, so that the little buggers don't go traipsing on the prairie grass. Eggs all over the park, with a couple golden prize winning eggs. Or something like that. You wouldn't want really little kids on the trails so there'd need to be their own special egg hunt on the grass somewhere, but kids 10-18, they'd be old enough to hurry along the trails looking for eggs, with some over exerting parents stumbling to keep up.

My backache woe is totally gone, hiking was good, semi-HOT, requiring that clothing be minimalized, and starting yesterday, even though it gets few visitors, so far, I have gotten the type feedback I was looking for to validate I was on the right track, so the new Durango Roadtripping idea is working out.

I've Recovered From Fort Worth Level Orange Ozone

Last night, when I still was having a sore throat and coughing fits, I was starting to doubt that this 4 day problem was caused by the Level Orange Ozone woes that had befallen the D/FW Metro zone in recent days.

I figured if my sore throat and cough were caused by the pollution that this would clear up as soon as I got to clean air. Well, I landed in Washington, hours later I still had a sore throat. I coughed all through the night.

Then this morning I was outside in the brisk, pine-scented morning air. It felt like I was breathing in super air, like it'd been somehow treated and made the way air should be.

By mid-morning I realized my sore throat was going away. I haven't coughed in hours. I believe I am cured. If this woe was caused by D/FW pollution I can't help but wonder how it effects those not in as good as shape as myself. I know one allergy prone Puerto Rican who was laid low and puffed up by the Level Orange Fort Worth Ozone.

Level Orange Ozone Making Me Sick

I don't know if we are at a Level Orange Ozone Alert again today, here in Texas. The air appears to be a bit clearer this morning.

The past 3 days I've developed a cough and sore throat. Yesterday I was over at my local Puerto Rican's and she told me I was having an allergic reaction to the Ozone. She's an amateur doctor in her spare time. She also suffers miserably from bad allergies which require potent meds.

Last night Miss Puerto Rico prescribed Eucalyptus Aroma Therapy for my sore throat and cough. This meant we sat and passed a bottle of Eucalyptus back and forth. This did not seem to have any salubrious effect for me. But the fumes made me tipsy.

Starting at approximately 6:25 pm, today, I should start getting some relief from this Level Orange Ozone threat, as I fly away from this polluted zone to a less polluted, I hope, zone.

Actually, if this trip to Washington is like my other 2 summers back up there, I will be remarking, for several days, how the air smells so good, like Christmas trees. And then I get used to it.

In about 13 and a half hours I will be picked up at Sea-Tac by a pair of poodles named Blue and Max. Tomorrow I hope I get to take them walking the Tacoma waterfront. Or somewhere. Actually just walking in their neighborhood is fun. Nice and hilly.