Wait A Minute, That's NOT A Corn Field!!

I took a road trip with my sons a couple of weeks ago and one of the most interesting things we saw as we crossed Michigan on US12 was acres and acres, miles and miles, of corn fields. I kept thinking that Americans sure grow a lot of corn. Then I started thinking about how we use all that corn.

Corn syrup for our pancakes (well, except for me, I like maple) and hi-fructose corn syrup to sweeten everything from Coke and Pepsi to Heinz Ketchup to candy bars. The cows and pigs and chickens we eat are fattened-up on corn. We pop it to take into the movies. We pump it into our cars as more and more of our gasoline is 10% ethanol... from corn, naturally. Corn starch, corn meal, corn muffins. Not to mention that we eat a lot of plain old corn, like on the cob at so many summer barbeques. Man alive, corn is everywhere. We're all going to turn into ears of corn if we're not careful. And about half a mile from my house, there's a corn field that's about to be converted to condos, if the signs are to be believed.

So I'm having a hard time feeling sorry for another corn field about to be converted to town houses, and that's just what I was feeling as I exited Lake Cook Road to turn up Milwaukee Avenue yesterday, just before sunset. That's when I noticed something very strange: that corn field I wasn't feeling sorry for, that plot of nature about to become condos that I wasn't pining over was beautifully backlit in the glow of an approaching sunset... and it was a gorgeous, golden, yellow color. That's when it hit me... that's no corn field, it's sunflowers!

Screech went the brakes, flash went the hazard lights, open flew the car door, up jumped the photographer, pop went the trunk and out came the tripod. On went the digital camera, plugged-in went the remote switch and buzz went the bumble-bee... frozen at 1/1000 of a second as snap went the shutter. Another case of you don't see if you're not looking.
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Sunflowers - Canon EOS-5D, 70~200/2.8 Canon Zoom Lens EF L Ultrasonic, ISO 100