good time vernal equinox

HELLO, SPRINGTIME.

I have news and announcements - first things first: Happy birthday to Martina!  Since we were born in the same year I can say this: Every birthday gets us closer to becoming wise women who hold the important cultural knowledge of our past, like the complete lyrics to Wham! Rap.

March has been a busy month so far - I got to meet Maggie - she's just moved back to Oregon and already knows the best cake restaurant in Salem! I know this because we ate some - I still think about that raspberry chocolate ganache. I briefly wondered if it would be weird at all to meet someone I knew only through email and the internet, but it was not! Maggie's lovely, her little dog is a sweetheart, and I'm so glad she's living close enough to visit in person.

In other news, I think I finally have an answer to why I have been so lethargic about this blog and life in general: not enough blood in my blood! Events of the last month led me to the doctor that I'd managed to avoid since I got insurance (last July), and she told me I was anemic and to start taking  iron supplements. I feel so much better! It's only been about 3 weeks, but I already have more energy, my fingernails are recovering, and the black circles under my eyes are fading away. Hurrah! Anyway - if you're feeling inexplicably logy, make them check your iron!

With that extra energy I took a walk on Tuesday and here are some of the pictures. I love springtime.




This is on the sidewalk in front of my house - the horse chestnut branches are getting thick and twisty like they do every spring. Soon there will be enormous bright green leaves and then white flowers.
(the sky was like this when I set out, but half an hour after I got home it was bright blue and you'd never know it was threatening rain like this just before.)




ha ha! looking at this now all I see are what look like dried grass clippings in the candytuft, but what I saw when I stopped to take the picture was GREEN, pops of purple, lacy white, and a line of hot pink fallen camellias at the top. Maybe I was just tired and wanted to stop. (this happens.)



I like how all the wires look like they're coming out of this yield sign.



This forsythia is aggressively cheerful and I love it. You're not going to miss that one.



CAMELLIA! I love how this looks against the white brick - I pretty much always love Camellias, especially in someone else's yard. (they are messy.) Anyway - this little vignette looked very fairy tale or story set somewhere else at the dawn of aluminum gutters to me.



Daffodils, man. They are so cheery without being as in your face as say, forsythia.



I'm sure this was to mark sidewalk or sewer repair, but I like to think someone wanted to make sure I knew I was going the right way.