The Best Thing That Happened This Week: It’s Very Corny
A Deptford couple’s (accidental) cornstalk grew a record-shattering 29 ears.
Rutgers agricultural agent/professor Michelle Infante-Casella (left) poses with Virginia and Matt Jacovelli and their cornstalk. Photograph courtesy Michelle Infante-Casella, Rutgers Cooperative Extension
What a week, huh? The anniversary of 9/11. Tweet wars. Spy wars! Stock market agita. Hurricane-gate. Bye-bye, Bolton! T-shirts that never should have been worn. Football fireworks (and not the good kind). We’re exhausted; how about you? So take refuge, just for a moment, in the unplanned, unexpected joy of Deptford’s Virginia and Matt Jacovelli, who, despite not being gardening types, are preparing for a one-of-a-kind harvest certified by the Guinness Book of World Records.
The Jacovellis figure they have a squirrel to thank for planting in their yard the seed that brought forth a cornstalk bearing a record-shattering 29 ears. (The norm is one or two; the prior record was a mere 16.) Man, that’s a lotta ears! Let’s all sit for a moment and ponder the meaning of this marvelous maize mutant. Could it possibly be a sign that we should all … talk less, and listen more?
Photograph courtesy Michelle Infante-Casella, Rutgers Cooperative Extension
