May 27

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Walking home. It had been stormy, earlier, and was still rather windy.

My intended subjects kept blowing out of the frame.....





Persisting.....





That's better.

Wet rose.







Storminess over, for the nonce, and the sky was very nice.





Iris.







Zinnias for sale at Downtown Home & Garden.







This one not as emphatically colored as its fellows, but look in the center..... An infinity of ... something ... waiting to open....... (as always, click on an image to embiggen)





Coleus.





Sky!





Phlox in front of fence.





Pinks and euphorbia(?).





Lupins.



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May 26

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Across William from the library.

Decorative horse chestnut. Loooove the colors.





Not the clearest shot. I liked the incipient seed pod with its fearsome spikes and spent pistil.





Iris.





Um. Hedgy thing. With fireworksy anthers.





Now on the way home.

Iris.





Gotta love iris. Ruffles, speckles, caterpillery thingies, a host of colors. Even perfume, if you are lucky.

This is the same plant as the above, and this is a better representation of its color. I'm not too fond of this beige and purple color scheme, but I have to admire the excess of excess of ruffles, speckles, etc.





Beside the railroad tracks.

Isn't it nice that someone took the trouble to plant aliums and irises where otherwise there would just be weeds?





A closeup of the grass in the above. I like the long curves of the leaves with the choppier texture of the seeds.





For some reason I'm thinking this is euphorbia....





Ooooh!







Orange and dusty green. Note pot plants, also orange and dusty green....





Iris.







Milkweed.



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May 23

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On the 23rd we got up, ate cheerios (thank goodness for 711), and headed out to the airport. We got there with no mishaps, returned the rental car, and got to the gate in good time.

A quintessential airport shot.





On our way.





Goodbye, Baltimore! Thanks for the excellent weather and good food!





It was cloudy a good portion of the way home. (Love these one-hour flights!)





A brief break in the clouds to enjoy the fields below.





More clouds.





This is Cleveland, Ohio.







I thought I might have captured Cedar Point (amusement park on the shore of Lake Erie), but when I got the pics up on the "big screen" it turned out to have been a factory. Ah well.



Here we are, coming in for a landing. I got a whole series of shots, with our plane's shadow getting bigger and bigger, but really they're not that interesting, so here is just one.





All in all, a lovely trip. Everything went smoothly, we saw and did everything we'd planned to see and do, we couldn't have asked for better weather, the food was delicious, the company was excellent.

Weren't we lucky!

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May 22, part 3

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Have you been fretting because you haven't seen the 22nd's food?

Not to worry; here we go.

Shepherd's pie, with a nice green salad.





Bailey's Irish Cream ice cream for the birthday girl.





After lunch we took my parents to the airport. We are so glad you could come! It was wonderful to have you with us for this special week!



Driving back into town.





Gorgeous, gorgeous day.





Back near campus. The area just north of campus is just beautiful.





This is my daughter's apartment building. One of her bedroom windows is in that nearest set of windows, fourth from the top, with the blinds closed.





Turning back in almost the same spot, to see what she sees through that window.

Nice, eh?





We have said the daughter is a foodie. I can't begin to tell you all the things that have been baked in this little (bitty!) toaster oven, particularly in the years before she had access to a real oven. Innumerable cookies. Pies. Bread. !!!





We went to another excellent restaurant for birthday dinner. Everything was very good indeed, and the foodie proclaimed that Jack's Bistro, overall, was the best we'd sampled on this trip. That is high praise; all but one of the places we visited were very good (and that one was ok, just not anything special you'd want to be sure to go back to).



Pause for a very short rant -- WHY do they make restaurants so dark? Looking at all the pretty colors is a big part of the whole experience....................... You can tell I had to break out the flash (which I almost never do!).



Crabcake, with purple Okinawan potatoes.





Scallops.





Duck, in a red curry sauce.





More birthday ice cream. One scoop of lavendar, one scoop of peppercorn, and a warm sugar cookie.





Happy birthday!!!

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