And Now I know What A Culm Is

I picked the last full camellia in the yard just now and put it in a vase. The shocking pink azaleas blossoms beside the porch have finally lost their joy and color and are turning brown as we speak. They certainly gave me a lot of pleasure, as did the camellias. 
I've seen the father cardinals feeding their young on the feeder which means that at least one whole generation of spring babies have hatched, feathered, and are so very close to living on their own. I love to watch the way the daddies pick up a seed and put it in the waiting beak of their young'un who is almost as big as the adult bird. I like that it is not just the mother who feeds the children but the father too. 
The bamboo still has perhaps two weeks more of showing up unannounced and unasked for. No matter how careful I am to try and find and kick each and every shoot, I always miss some and don't find them until they're too big to take out with a kick. As they grow upwards, they also grow in diameter and become less pliable and harder to kick.
Okay. That sentence is just nature and science so don't accuse me of anything.

But what happens is that I'll inevitably find four or five-foot tall bamboo growing someplace like the camellia bed or right beside the porch where it successfully camouflaged itself as part of the structure which means there's no way I'm taking that thing out without a saw. "How did I miss that?" I'll say to myself, gazing up at an almost mature stem which I just discovered is called a "culm". Now that I did not know. I am trying to prevent culms in the yard. 

I made a very nice discovery just a little while ago which is that the pot of giant begonias I'd left outside during winter's cold, protected only by a sheet, is not dead at all, but coming back beautifully. 

Having seen that, I checked out the pot where the split-leaf philodendron looked suspiciously dead, I dug around and found this.

Hello, my darling green things! 

Now if the banyon and tropical gardenia on the front porch start to show any signs of life, I will be most happy. And if they don't...aw well. 

I was looking for an empty pot when I found those two sweethearts this afternoon. Liz Sparks, whom I met for breakfast, gave me some rootlings of a plant known as horsemint and some other common names but its Latin name is the most fun of all and is Mornarda Punctata. I think it can be a bit invasive and we know where that could lead us so I think I'll try to grow it in a container. Liz says that it is a fabulous pollinator attractor. I'd seen the plant before as it is quite noticeable in bloom but did not know what it was. 

I made two appointments today. One for the kidney stone scan and one to get my shingles vaccine. The scan will be in a couple of weeks and I discovered that the order wasn't sent from my urologist's to the place I thought it had been sent to (and even given a card for by staff at the urology place) but the radiology department of the local hospital. 
Whatever. 
The shingles vaccine I know I need because I have heard that getting shingles is not an experience anyone would ask for and if it can be prevented...

I also made Glen an appointment to get one.
Our shingles vaccines are scheduled for tomorrow after we have had lunch with Ms. Magnolia June at her school as it is lunch with grandparents day there. We bring her lunch and join her in the school cafeteria. She wanted the same thing she wanted last year which is a ham and lettuce and tomato sandwich with mayonnaise, cheetos, and mini cupcakes. She called me herself several weeks ago to give me a heads-up about the date. This is the sort of thing that Maggie thrives on. And what elementary-aged child does not like being the special one every now and then?

I've heard the shingles vaccine can lay a person out for a day or two and I am such an over-reactor to vaccines I am expecting that. The damn thing is, is that I really don't feel that well now. Achy, tired (I took a nap!) and rather unexcited about life in general. And I see that Trump has managed to tank the world economy, starting right here in the good ol' USA by not having the slightest clue how tariffs work or what they are and although some good things are happening, especially as to people being stunned at his administration's stupidity, not one day goes by without a completely new low being hit.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama accidentally photobombed a little family taking family photos in Washington, DC.  

You know what I did when I saw that picture?

I cried. 

You know what I did just now when I looked at it again? 

I cried. I cried for what America was when we elected Barack Obama as our president and what it has become now. 

How in hell did this happen? 

Love...Ms. Moon