Thunder and Roses

It was a beautiful morning, bright and sunny. In keeping with the pace of the weekend, I rather sleepily repeated that first coffee/early watering routine, but a little later today.

It was already getting sort of humid, so it felt like a scorcher was on the way. I was at work a few hours later when suddenly the bright sun vanished and a host of storm clouds came piling in over us from the west.

We could hear the telltale rumblings of thunder, not sounding at all far off as the skies darkened and it looked like we'd be in for a nice thunderboomer, bringing some much welcomed rain and the possibility of the thrill of a good lightning show.


And then just as quickly, the clouds brightened and before long the sun was shining brilliantly once more.

Those white blossoms up above are the flowers of the kousa dogwood tree in the gardens outside the restaurant. It always puts on such a lovely show, first in the spring with these flowers and then later in the summer, as it develops its red spiny fruits.

Here's two more roses in that same garden which have come on strong in the past few days.

Neither are especially fragrant, but their beauty forgives much.