The tree that smells like cum.
The Simulation Theory is a hypothesis that posits ‘reality’ is actually Reality™: what we humans experience as real is simply a construct by unknown developers, which makes you, me, and pavements all just bits of code.
If we run with that theory, ‘Spring’ is one of the four annually recurring ‘Seasons’ ‘Life’ unfolds over. As you know, it comes right after ‘Winter’. That’s the cold and miserable bastard of a season that spans six months of darkness, punctuated by the artificial fairy lights of Christmas.
In Winter, the weather chat—a national pasttime in the UK and Ireland—is a mixture of complaint and hope:
‘This weather is awful! Although, it won’t be long now until we see a bit of sun.’
‘Sun? What’s that?!’
‘Ho ho ho!’
Eventually, Spring uncoils, announcing itself in half-hour blocks of light tacked on to either side of darkness. In the meantime, the developers’ program puts most of the leaves back on the brown sticks, flowers reemerge en masse, and the temperature dial clicks clockwise a tad so our weather chat now consists of talking-up the grand stretch in the evenings, instead of simply wishing for its arrival.
Alas, it isn’t all sunshine and levity once Spring has sprung. In a mischievous move, those pesky developers slipped a bit of cheeky code into Spring; a sinister ploy to wipe smiles and sour moods right as everything is beginning to look up.
That code is Pyrus Calleryana. It’s a tree—known in English as the ‘Callery Pear’—and it is quite the practical joke. You see, just as your olfactories might be filling with the vapours of fresh cut grass on a nice Spring day, a chance encounter with the Callery Pear can change everything.
In an instant, pleasure will turn to pain as the Pear produces a stench that’ll make you gag on your lolly as you idle round the park.
That stench—which issues from the Pear’s bright white flowers—is a ringer for freshly-arrived cum. You know, the sexual effusions that resemble a cross between warm bleach and musk. Lavender, it ain't.
Unfortunately, in the UK the Callery Pear is ubiquitous with a capital Eh. Vuh. Ree. Where. That’s because the Callery—after making its stinky journey westward from China in the late 19th Century—became a designer darling. Revered for its pretty, pyramid-like appearance and bright white leaves, gardeners across the US and the UK couldn’t get those stinky seeds into the ground quickly enough — power-planting the Pear along streets, in gardens, and around parks all throughout the 20th century.
However, in horticultural circles the Pear poses problems that extend way beyond its funky flowers. A quick scan online reveals lots of green-fingered types bemoaning the tree’s structural defects, its invasiveness (it adversely affects native species), and, of course, that rank rank smell.
Incidentally, the flowers smell as they do to attract flies, which then go on to pollinate new Cum Trees. To attract the flies, the flowers contain trimethylamine and dimethylamine, which resembles ammonia. There’s ammonia in semen. And, that’s why there’s a tree that smells like cum on almost every street you walk down.
What to do about the Cum Tree?
Fed up with the Pear, certain US states outlawed the sale and planting of the Pear, with many more poised to follow suit.
A hopeful search for ‘callery pear uk ban’ search yielded no results. It just pointed back to the US-related articles, which means the Cum Trees–unless one of the Reality™ developers sees this article–are here to stay. Boo.