flowers, herbs, and an attempt at responsibility

lest anyone think i have completely stopped being a productive and contributing member of society, you will be relieved to know that i get back into the swing of things right after memorial day. until then though... i vacation! but, i did attempt to fulfill certain pre-work responsibilities today by purchasing a book i need for the clinic i'm participating in this summer. first, i checked the bookmart's hours online to ensure that i would not make the trip in vain.

(the bookmart: the only place to buy the book).

i get there around 12:30pm. as you can see, a perfectly reasonable time to go:


but hmm... it's all closed up... shut down... as if no one would notice or mind that they aren't practicing what they preach their hours to be....

sigh... i will have to be responsible some other day....

so instead, i decide that today would be a nice day to plant some flowers on our balcony. first thing's first-- lunch, latte, and some time to read my book which i have vowed to finish today... (we'll see if that happens).

good food at the manna cafe.

off to the plant store where i pick out all the plants i can find which brag about being able to tolerate sunny days since that is all we get on our balcony... that is, assuming the sun is out. i.e. we get virtually no shade.


the finished products: (note: i'm not so good at flower names so i'm just telling you what the tag claims they are named.)

salvia farinacea...

red super bells and artist blue violets

artist blue violets... a closer inspection....

daisy...

chamomile....

now for some of our herbs (i guess technically chamomile is an herb... right?). we planted this cilantro from seed and then it got battered and beaten from days of wind and rain, but it's determined, and i have faith it's going to succeed...

spearmint... which, we didn't plant as a seed. it's the product of a farmer's market. we tried to start mint from seed but it never did anything. stubborn and unwilling. ah well.

the last of the flowers: radiation. it has a scientific name but 'radiation' sounds better... especially with a nuclear nerd in the house.

the end!

oh, for those who are interested re: the scotch brite mop. well, half of it fit under the washing machine... so basically, i couldn't get under there very far. oh well. also though, i'm not quite so sure about that mop in general... or others designed like it. it's just so floppy. it swivels every which way despite my attempts to direct it to remain in certain positions. plus, it doesn't really fit into a bucket... that is, half of it does... and only after it's decided to swivel into it. now i know it's more like a dry mop... but isn't that some sort of an oxymoron or something? if you're a mop, you should expect to get wet, and it's not unreasonable for that state of mopness to occur by means of water in a bucket. bear in mind, this is just one user's reviews, but think hard before you go out and purchase one yourself. do you really want a mop telling you what to do?