Peony

We have peonies in our yard, and as you can see, the first one bloomed today :-)

I just got back from visiting with friends in Poulsbo yesterday. We met them while stationed in Italy and they're great people-- they just got back from overseas last summer, so it's been great to be able to see them again. Poulsbo is a town on the west side of Puget Sound. Technically, it's only a few miles southwest of us, but to get there from our side of the sound, you either have to take a ferry or the Tacoma Narrows bridge. If you take the bridge (which I did) it's a two-hour drive. But when the weather is as beautiful as it has been over the past few weeks, and you've got a fresh mix CD in the car, who cares?

While staying in Poulsbo, our friend S and I visited Port Gamble, which is a cute, historical little town with a lot of antique shops and a wonderful place called LaLa Land Chocolates, where we had chocolate high tea. Which is: tea (or their fabulous Mayan hot chocolate, which contains almonds, cinnamon, and habanero pepper powder!), copious tea sandwiches, a giant scone, a chocolate-dipped orange flower cookie, a truffle, and fresh fruit with chocolate fondue.

Today F's mom and I did some errands and visited a local nursery, which had these roosters and a cat. Oh, yes, and plants! ;-)

Expect to be subjected to endless pictures of plants here, by the way. I just finished setting up a cutting garden and have just started working my way through the weed-clogged vegetable bed. Seedlings seem to be coming up faster than I can make room for them! What on earth inspired me to plant six flats of seeds at once, anyway?

*points surreptitiously in the direction of yougrowgirl.com, and logs off*

Matsuken Samba!

I signed up for Blogspot today following in the footsteps of my friends Y and R. Hi, guys! I don't have much to write about, but while I'm here, let me ramble about my new love for MATSUKEN SAMBA!

While in Tokyo, my sister and I caught a special TV feature about the Matsuken Samba craze that hit last year, and damn, it's kinda hypnotic. Picture this: a 51-year old actor, famous for playing the serious, macho lead role in a popular samurai TV drama, dons a samurai wig and glittery gold kimono, gets onstage in front of a full stadium of fans, and starts wiggling his hips and waving his arms flamboyantly to the time of a Latin beat, flanked by similarly wigged-and-sequined samurais and bejeweled geishas.

To get the full kitch effect, you have to visit the website and click on the Real or WMP links for video footage.