How beautiful could a sentence sound?

[sovay]

I got out of the house before it rained this evening and photographed flowers to remind myself the world is still alive.



I always thought these small flowers belonged to deadly nightshade (Atropa belladonna), but they turn out to belong to bittersweet nightshade (Solanum dulcamara) instead. It's an invasive species in North America. I grew up seeing it in yards everywhere and had no idea.



I am used to rhododendrons as bushes. I am not used to them as trees. I realize the perspective of the shot somewhat obscures it, but this one topped out at the second-floor deck.



I know zilch about rose cultivars: I am just glad the deep pink color came out in the overcast. It made me think of Marilyn Monroe performing "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953).



I was surprised to see beach roses growing in the formerly vacant lot that is now a staging area for the GLX. They went with the faint sea-smell of the rain-coming air.



We acquired Garak from Forbidden Planet in 2013 and for a couple of years he traveled around with us to various destinations like the Boston Harbor Islands and Orlando. spatch observed earlier this afternoon that he hadn't been out of the house in ages. So we took him to see the Knights of Malta Hall. He seemed to like it.



I was enthralled by the color and the texture of these petunias. They looked like old velvet curtains.



I still know zilch about rose cultivars: I loved the densely packed whorl of the petals. It looked like the sort of flower it is folklorically dangerous to pluck.



Just some very good ivy engulfing the side of the local microbrewery.

We heard sirens after we got home. Pandemic? Police? There are so many things to stay safe from. And too many of them that must be braved.

Comments

[yhlee]

Thank you for the beautiful view of flowers.

Stay safe, all.

[sovay]

Thank you for the beautiful view of flowers.

You're welcome. I enjoy doing it, as well as I think it is one of the things keeping me as stable as I am.

Stay safe, all.

We're doing our best. You, too.

[heron61]

Those are awesome pictures - thank you. Also, those petunias are especially amazing - they look like richly colored crushed velvet - I'd love a shirt or blazer made from a fabric that exact color.

[gwynnega]

Those petunias are incredible.

[sovay]

Those are awesome pictures - thank you.

You're welcome! And thank you.

Also, those petunias are especially amazing - they look like richly colored crushed velvet - I'd love a shirt or blazer made from a fabric that exact color.

Definitely a blazer. Or a smoking jacket, although I don't smoke. It's so rich.

[sovay]

Those petunias are incredible.

I'd never seen ones like them before. They were just arresting.

[thawrecka]

Beautiful flowers.

[sovay]

Beautiful flowers.

Thank you! The yards are mostly small and chain-linked around here, but people grow neat things in them.

[rosefox]

I am used to rhododendrons as bushes. I am not used to them as trees.

I've been told that in the South there is such a thing as a rhododendron forest and I want very badly to visit one.

[sovay]

I've been told that in the South there is such a thing as a rhododendron forest and I want very badly to visit one.

Take me with you.

[thisbluespirit]

Oh, those really are some gorgeous flower shots. Thank you for sharing! (Also I'm glad Garak enjoyed his walk.XD)

For the rest: ♥

[shewhomust]

I, too, like the Knights of Malta Hall. Also the flowers ...

[cmcmck]

So very alive:

https://cmcmck.dreamwidth.org/994600.html

This is an open post if anyone else wants to go and look.

You found some lovely images! :o)

[tree_and_leaf]

Thank you for sharing these photos!

[redbird]

When cattitude and I were living in the Pacific Northwest, even the rhododendron shrubs were larger, and taller, than I was used to from New York, and there was a rhododendron tree planted next to a path near the Bellevue Transit Center.

This being a Seattle suburb, there was a short, and I think young, palm tree near it.

Rhododendrons are native to the area, and very well adapted to it; one species of palm is "locally naturalized" in the Seattle area, but seems to mostly be planted deliberately in front of houses, in the positions where you might otherwise find stone lions.

[moon_custafer]

I’ve never liked petunias, but I will grudgingly admit that those ones are a beautiful colour/texture. Yesterday I saw a photo on r/gardening of a “Night Sky” petunia that looks like a drip-bleached t-shirt: https://www.reddit.com/r/gardening/comments/6bra76/my_night_sky_petunia/

[asakiyume]

Marvelous photos--my eye keeps being drawn by the folds of the folkloric rose.

Regarding rhododendrons being tall, if you go to the corner of Meriam Street and Castle Street in Lexington, just where Merriam Street starts heading up to Granny Hill, you can see just masses of towering rhododendrons, and someone told me--I forget who!--that it's because there used to be a castle-like house, and the guy who owned it collected rhododendrons, and he planted them by the gates up his drive (?? I'm maybe garbling this), and they grew to be huge, and people come from all over at this time of year to see and photograph them, masses in pink and dark pink and white.

--Oh hey, in trying to find something more authoritative than my memory, I found this:
"The property boasted a small natural pond near the top of the Hill, and several varieties of rare and imported plants including orchids, camellias, and rhododendrons cultivated by [lawyer, state senator, and U.S. congressman Francis B.] Hayes. As president of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, Hayes won several awards for his rhododendrons. To this day they continue to be maintained on Castle Road." --Richard Kollen, Lexington: From America's Birthplace to Progressive Suburb, 2004.

(I realize you can't get to the corner of Meriam Street and Castle Street at all this June... maybe next year, if we're lucky.)

[sovay]

Oh, those really are some gorgeous flower shots. Thank you for sharing!

You're welcome! And thank you.

(Also I'm glad Garak enjoyed his walk.XD)

He's been suffering from social isolation, too.

For the rest: ♥

*hugs*

[sovay]

I, too, like the Knights of Malta Hall. Also the flowers ...

Thank you!

I have become surprisingly attached to the Knights of Malta Hall. I think it's the brick and green copper.

[sovay]

You found some lovely images!

Thank you!

Your woodlands are beautiful. I miss walking over fields and among trees. There were still some places around here one could do it.

[sovay]

Thank you for sharing these photos!

You're welcome!

[sovay]

Rhododendrons are native to the area, and very well adapted to it; one species of palm is "locally naturalized" in the Seattle area, but seems to mostly be planted deliberately in front of houses, in the positions where you might otherwise find stone lions.

That's a wonderful set of images.

[sovay]

I’ve never liked petunias, but I will grudgingly admit that those ones are a beautiful colour/texture.

They looked pure black from some angles, but I found them more beautiful when the underlying Tyrian purple could be seen.

Yesterday I saw a photo on r/gardening of a “Night Sky” petunia that looks like a drip-bleached t-shirt

Good grief. It really does. I've never seen that before.

[sovay]

Marvelous photos--my eye keeps being drawn by the folds of the folkloric rose.

Thank you!

(I realize you can't get to the corner of Meriam Street and Castle Street at all this June... maybe next year, if we're lucky.)

I could ask one of my parents to take a picture for me. My mother especially likes rhododendrons. And that sounds wonderful.

[moon_custafer]

I look at it and I can taste grape Kool-Aid.

[moon_custafer]

People occasionally get lost in rhododendrons: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/thursday-rcmp-safety-germany-cave-rescue-lost-in-rhododendrons-and-more-1.2903459/we-got-caught-by-that-monster-rescue-workers-save-couple-from-irish-rhododendron-forest-1.2903462

[sovay]

People occasionally get lost in rhododendrons

This makes me wonder if the house described above by asakiyume was actually some nineteenth-century American Sleeping Beauty thing.

[redbird]

I was particularly amused by seeing the palm trees with snow on the ground.

[chomiji]

Lovely flowers. I think my most recent flower photos will end up on Book of Faces again because I'm lazy.

Also, *hugs*

[sovay]

Lovely flowers. I think my most recent flower photos will end up on Book of Faces again because I'm lazy.

Thank you! Flower photos in different places are still valid.

*hugs*

[nineweaving]

Lovely!

There are rhododendron forests in the Himalayas. They are spectacular--and leech-infested.

*hugs*

Nine

[sovay]

Lovely!

Thank you!

There are rhododendron forests in the Himalayas.

That is a piece of botanical accuracy on the part of Black Narcissus (1947) I had not suspected!

They are spectacular--and leech-infested.

I'll bring salt.

*hugs*

[alchimie]

Those petunias are breathtaking -- when I first saw them scrolling down I had thought they were art or (as you said) fabric, not an actual plant.

[sovay]

Those petunias are breathtaking -- when I first saw them scrolling down I had thought they were art or (as you said) fabric, not an actual plant.

Thank you!

I'd never seen a flower of that texture and shade before.