Tiny Dramas All Around

In the garden yesterday, I noticed that a minuscule blossom from our olive tree had fallen into the middle of a seed head on the clematis. That's a design worthy of a jeweler, isn't it? Or a fireworks display.

Dave wasn't feeling well yesterday so he stayed home from work. The school year is basically over anyway -- his last classes were Monday -- so "work" at this point is just a matter of tidying up the department and filing and that kind of thing. Instead he stayed home and camped out in his chair. He plans to go in today.

In the morning I heard a lot of thumping around above us and on the stairs and realized our upstairs neighbor is moving out of the Russians' flat. Apparently his family is back in Israel so he's downsizing to a smaller flat closer to his office. I'm sorry to see him go because he's been a terrific neighbor, and I told him so. He said another family is scheduled to move in at the beginning of July. We'll see what that's like.

In the afternoon I took a long walk and spent some time looking at the bugs in the butterfly garden at the cemetery:

You'll see some thick-legged flower beetles, Oedemera nobilis, which I have often likened on this blog to David Bowie in his Aladdin Sane costume. And at 0:14, if you look at the left-hand flower, you'll see a white crab spider (Misumena vatia) that has grabbed some poor fly, or possibly two poor flies. I left the natural sound in the video, so you'll hear birdcalls and wind as well as the shouts of some teams on the athletic field adjacent to the cemetery. Summer sounds!

I didn't see any butterflies in the butterfly garden, oddly, but I did find this Angle Shades moth (Phlogophora meticulosa) in our living room yesterday morning. Maybe it flew in when we had the light on the night before. I gently put it outside on a buddleia. Hopefully it promptly moved where it would be better camouflaged.