This detailed report from in-house mad doctor Dr. Roy Cordato reminds me to check in on the Charlotte area ozone count and — let me guess, seeing as we’ve had a mild, non-drought summer — the official state results show exactly no Code Red ozone days and only nine Code Orange readings so far this year.

As Cordato notes the same story is being repeated all over the state, and this with tighter ozone standards the feds imposed last year. You may remember last summer the Uptown paper took an uptick in bad readings to mean that the air was bad and getting worse, without bothering to tell readers the goalposts had been moved.

Now, with those same tighter standards triggering fewer ozone alerts, where is the parade?

I’ve said it for years: If we are truly concerned about our air quality, we’ll start work on a weather machine. Everything else is merely a contributing factor.