From Benita Bendon Campbell yesterday, a delightful plant, new to her, that had just come into her life. Her photo:
(#1) A white Scaevola aemula cultivar, in a hanging pot; the plant grows as a garden shrub, but hangs or drapes quite satisfyingly, as here
The scaevola plant was new to me as well; it was hard to believe that I’d never come across a plant whose common name is fairy fan-flower and has cultivars that are intensely purplish-blue:
Among the scent notes in the “unisex perfume” A City on Fire — burnt match is another, but that doesn’t require looking things up — from the Imaginary Authors company, whose remarkable fragrances come with synopses of fictitious works of extravagant fiction and with striking graphic-designer labels on their bottles.
The perfumes aren’t cheap — $95 for a 50 ml bottle ($38 for a 14 ml Traveler size, $6 for a 2 ml Sample size) — but then we don’t know how many bottles get sold, and how much the perfumes are actually worn, as opposed to being treasured and displayed as art objects with an olfactory as well as visual and textual dimensions.
Yesterday’s Wayno/Piraro Bizarro, with songs you just can’t get out of your head:
(#1) (If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Dan Piraro says there are 6 in this strip — see this Page.)
A wonderful collision of worlds, set off by the idiomatic (and colorfully metaphorical) N + N compound earworm: the world of DJs — the ear world (disc jockeys providing sonic pleasures for the ear) — and the world of caterpillars — the worm world (caterpillars being one type of worm in colloquial English).
(Flowers and music for diversion in difficult times.)
Ann Burlingham, towards the end of her recent visit to family in Australia, posted photos of a poinciana tree in gorgeous bloom. Among them:
(#1) Royal poinciana or flame tree, Delonix regia, in the pea / bean family (the legumes, or Fabaceae)
(Note: it’s been extraordinarily hot in Oz, and significant parts of the southeast are consumed in flames, but Ann — and Jason and Henry — were far from the fire zone when she photographed the poinciana.)
An American friend of Ann’s commented, “I had never seen or heard of it before!” I responded, “Maybe you’d never heard about the flowering tree, but surely you’ve heard the jazz ballad.” But no. It seems that unless you’re into jazz or are really old — the heyday of “Poinciana” was apparently the 1940s through the 60s — you don’t know the song. (I’ve been asking around, and mostly just get blank stares.)
Yesterday’s posting “Hung with care” was about, among many other things, animal alphabets, including in #8 one from Sally King McBride (going from alligator A to zebra Z), about which Robert Coren asked in a comment:
(#1)
Do you happen to know who the “X” bird in #8 is? It’s the only one I can’t identify.
How many X birds could there be? you ask. Well, a fair number, but my guess on this one is the ovenbird xenops, but I could be wrong. (McBride is alive and working in NYC, so if someone wants to figure out how to get in touch with her and is willing to write to her, they might be able to find out her intentions and report on them here.)
I’ll get to the fangs and the pumpkin eventually, but first a taxonomic puzzle in botany and two botanical puzzles in (Mexican) Spanish, triggered by this Pinterest photo from a while back:
(#1) [as captioned by its (Mexican) poster] Lirio plantasonya
The (Christian) liturgical colors for the season: white for Easter Sunday, red for today, Good Friday, the day of crucifixion (and for some churches, red for all of Holy Week). White the color of purity and perfection, and so of Jesus as Christ. Red the color of blood and sacrifice, and so of the crucifixion.
As it happens, yesterday’s events included a visit to the Gamble Garden in Palo Alto, where I encountered two especially notable flowers, one white, one deep red. First, the flowers, not (at first) identified:
(#1) Blanchier
(#2) Rougier
Moment one, the name game: this photograph of a plant in bloom, presented as an identification quiz by Elizabeth Daingerfield Zwicky on Facebook yesterday:
(#1) EDZ’s hint: “neither roses nor daffodils”. Guesses from readers: jonquils, tulips, crocuses, and, finally bingo!
Moment two, today’s morning name: montbretia, which turns out to be a name for Crocosmia hybrids, like this one:
(#2) Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’
A Wayno & Piraro Bizarro from the 4th, presenting an exercise in cartoon understanding and jogging some reflections on comics conventions:
(#1) (If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Dan Piraro says there are 3 in this strip — see this Page.)
To understand the cartoon, you need to appreciate that it shows a situation from everyday life (the office of a carpentry business) juxtaposed with, or translated into, another, more remarkable, world (an undersea, aquatic, world, populated by specific fish, which you need to recognize).
