Mushrooms

It was so gross, I'm not even going to post a picture.

I live in Seattle. You've probably been told that Seattle isn't really as rainy as the rumors are. Forget that nonsense. Seattle is moist. It's damp. It's a place where lawns either flourish (because of the epic rain) or they die (because the soil drains water so quickly). An old term for long-term Seattleites is "mossbacks." See, because they grow moss on their back! Because ... well, you get it.

I had mushrooms growing in my backyard.

I'm not talking about small cute little mushrooms. These mf'ers were HUGE. Four damn inches in diameter. They were ridiculous.

I didn't see a caterpillar anywhere,

but that wouldn't have surprised me at all.

How long do they have to grow to get to be four inches wide?! Good lord! (And what does this mean about my yardwork skills?)

Now, here's the gross part. I cleaned them up yesterday. The mushrooms were not only huge, but they were DISGUSTING. Some of them were whole and intact and could be removed by the stem. But some of them ...

had rotted. They had liquified. The mushrooms had turned into nasty black tar that stuck to the grass when I picked them up.

You know what happens when you forget about a bag of lettuce in your vegetable drawer, and when you pull it out, it's black liquid. THAT was what I found.

There are now black puddles of ex-mushrooms in my backyard. I'm praying for some of that Seattle rain to wash them away, because it is the GROSSEST THING EVER.

My theory is that these were actually the zombie mushrooms. I found the ones that had died and then reanimated to zombify their fungal brethren. Except, they're mushrooms, so they're plugged into the ground. And that's why they liquified where they stood, like an incredibly gross version of what happens to vampires in Buffy.

Come to think of it, that would have been better. Why couldn't they have just exploded and turned into powder?