I appear to be in Athens today.

I am beyond tired with jet lag.

But I'm not complaining, as this is the view from the roof of our hotel. Yep, that's the Acropolis.

The travel gods were kind to us. Our hotel...

...had our room ready for us when we rolled (staggered?) in around 11 this morning. We crashed, hard, and groggily peeled ourselves out of bed for a late afternoon stroll.

There she is, peeking out from above the ramparts. Oh - oh - oh! This is going to have to be explored in a serious way. But not today. We got close enough to get tickets to the Acropolis and a handful of other sites, and wandered around the base of the hill a bit...

A healthy respect for marble. This, I can appreciate.

I must sleep, or my brains will pickle in their own juices. I am predicting sensory and cognitive overload. It's bizarre being functionally illiterate, but exposure to Russian (and hence, the Cyrillic alphabet) in college has already proved helpful. 

See you tomorrow. Sweet dreams...

tipping points

I finally, finally, finally, have been able to almost-witness how False Solomon Seal’s berries get red. It’s a matter of both the speckles...

...and the blush. The picture above is from July (of last year, but never mind that). The one below is from this afternoon. Check out how that green has turned to a pale shrimp.

This may explain how some Canada Mayflower berries near our front door have popped from speckled to red inside a single afternoon. See that blush creeping in?

Back to False Solomon. Just a couple of feet away, this one’s way farther along.

Pow.

 

These pix are, amazingly, off the iPhone. I spent an hour or so calibrating my fine motor skills and telepathic communication skills to figure out how to get my style of macro shots using just the phone. It’s...OK. Not nearly as crisp as I like, but not too bad. I do like the color, though. The light levels were low, and the phone is apparently way more forgiving than even the Mighty Lumix.

A late lunch.

Speaking of magenta, POKEWEED.

 

butter-and-eggs, good to see you!

So let’s see if I’ll have my act together. Next up: the Acropolis. See you in a couple of days.