calicheEver wished you could be away from natural beauty like trees, grass and other greenery, and live in a lifeless, blasted heath? This nightmare is now possible, thanks to the ancient mystery known as caliche (pronounced “call-ee-chay”). Caliche is a very hard, rocklike substance that develops in arid lands like Tucson, Arizona. Wikipedia has a nice article about it. This article, while containing many “useful facts”, about caliche, fails to capture the true essense of this material. Caliche is a purely hateful mineral: a cancer on the planet that is literally impervious to standard means of excavation. I know this because my yard is infected with the stuff. The Wikipedia’s primary solution to the myriad problems caliche causes is to “remove the caliche and… [replace it with some other, non-concrete-based type of soil]“. Riight. Remove it…