Took this yesterday evening. The wet air was full of the scent of roses.

I am procrastinating on my yoga sequence for class next week and the yoga blog entry that will go with it. It is the way of holiday weekends.

Saw a gorgeous woodpecker today on my long walk up Terwilliger. It had to be a Red-Breasted Sapsucker because of the elongated white patch across the wing and the whole head was red. A first so close to home!

Here is the link for the 7-minute workout from the May 12th New York Times Magazine.

According to the weather reports, this afternoon and evening were the last time one is going to be able to go out without a coat and in sandals for, well, weeks.

I took full advantage and had an iced green tea in the sun while waiting for my dentist appointment and then after I did my shopping I walked the long walk up to the Chart House.

It was lovely, particularly when the traffic calmed down and one could hear the birds in the parkway.

The weather. It is the story these days isn't it? Those tornadoes are in Oklahoma are frightening.

Poor Stella thew up again last night. Something about this round of kitty infirmities is pushing me over the edge into a world of emotional exhaustion. For too long, making too many decisions on my own that seem freighted with the responsibility of a care taker.

I am beginning to think this is the real reason folks couple up. To share the decisions.

The physical exhaustion I can deal with and spiritually I believe there are some answers to the sense of feeling separate or isolated that my current work situation fosters so deeply but what do I do about the emotional exhaustion?

We did finally get a break it the oppressive cool gloom late in the day and tomorrow is supposed to be just lovely. I am looking forward to that.

We didn't actually have anything but glare filled damp gloom today so I am glad I got this shot a few days ago. The iris were pretty spectacular here this year and I am sad to see their time pass.

I am missing the season finale of Doctor Who right now but I haven't been watching much of anything lately. I've been listening to audiobooks and reading mysteries and thinking about yoga instead.

Fingers crossed Stella can make it through a second night without throwing up.

Here is an interesting blog full of cool found things.

So this is the iris bud shot I took that looks a bit like it is from another planet and alive. I got distracted by that red tea rose yesterday. I took this picture outside last weekend and used my somewhat rumpled light diffuser as a background. If I do say so myself, and I will because this is my blog, its is a very cool picture.

My link today is the first in the series on yoga for older folks in the NYT's. William Broad interviewed this doctor for his Science of Yoga book. This is the doctor who used headstand to cure his own rotator cuff injury. Please don't try that at home folks! The 2nd part was just published this week here.

I am going to think deeply about all I read here before I change any of my teaching techniques. It is an unfolding story. I noticed Leslie Kaminoff (my Yoga Anatomy go to guy) asked a question in the 2nd part. All very interesting.

Yep. My colors are clashing. Oh well. One goes with what is blooming.

I am glad we are getting rain. The gloom I could do without but I was able to go and walk fast on the track this noon. Movie star good looking guy over there running without his shirt on. Oh poor me.

My link today is to info on the Planet Money T-Shirt. In spite of the controversy about the fact that the ladies shirt will be pink, it will be made in South American. It is the Men's they are making in Bangladesh. I have been enjoying this whole adventure and look forward to wearing my squirrel to teach yoga in. :)

Okay so this probably clashes with the red below. A whole other rose feel.

Here are a couple of links to these amazing photos of whole trees in South Korea by Myoung Ho Lee and another  link to to the New York Times Feature page on his work. Gorgeous, amazing and fascinating...

Before I saw them, I took a photo of a tightly furled iris bud the other day with my light diffuser behind it framing it exactly like these trees (only on a much smaller scale). It looks almost alive. You'll see. Great minds... Ha!

Roses are challenging to get right.

I am happy with this one. Dreamy, painterly.

The gloom has returned but my return to work isn't as crazy making today as I expected after taking Friday off. Cool!

I am pleased with this picture. It was a complicated shot, I had to get up on my toes on someone's private property and stretch yesterday. Our roses are gorgeous but blooming way too early.

Of course the sun that has been bestowing its beneficence on the roses has also been ripening the strawberries early. Yum.

This short little film is a couple of years old but it is just plain silly fun. And with our world in such upheaval who can't use a little silly fun?

Happy Mother's Day.

We went birding out a Powell Butte yesterday, enjoying a chunk of this astonishingly warm making the roses bloom early weather.

This is the best picture I got out there. It was hazy but the mountains were visible. As were the construction crews working on the reservoir.

I hope by the end of the summer to be able to make it out there on my bike.

Sorry I have been not posting so much here. Work overtime really cuts into one's picture taking time. I did get out today to get some nice ones so hang in there and check back. :)

That is, if you like pretty flowers.

Opening peonies from last weekend. I am enjoying the astonishing warmth and relaxing this weekend. It is so rare for us to actually get to see spring.

My link today is a bit of a meditation on complaining. It is an interesting discussion. Spiritually I know it is not the best course of action but emotionally there is a lot to be said for small doses in the right places.

There were all these amateur riders on the bus this afternoon that were going downtown to drink. These middle aged men all cheerful with an alcohol buzz sitting on the seats with their legs as wide apart as possible. They all thought, and said they thought, I was unusually aggressive because as no one would move to the back I just pushed my way back there. And then when we reached my stop I had to physically move the high guy in the tie dye with his earbuds standing in the back door well and blocking my exit. In a delayed reaction, he yelled at me after I was off.

"Nothing is more unseemly in society than an angry woman" says Claire Messud author of The Woman Upstairs. It seems all these very occasional bus riders would agree with her.

I had groceries! Darn it all.

It is such a challenge to capture what the eye sees. The sweep of this batch of iris in the evening breeze that softens the eyes connected to the work weary brain and reminds us that there is beauty out there everywhere.

There must have been some sort of accident on the freeway this afternoon. A trip to the grocery that normally takes 40 minutes took an hour and a half. And there was a drug addled young man, (I call him Hula Hoop boy, because he had one) that seemed determined to get attention any way he could waiting at the bus stop, as was another young man with a leg injury, a recent Vet, I'd bet.

I had plenty of time to ponder the back stories of these two and the other tattooed more attractive fellow as they all decided to smoke at the same time.

To recover I went over to the gym and read this article on half wild cats in the current New Yorker, which I get on my Kindle. I learned some stuff.  And slowly recovered my ability to be cheerful in the world of others.