Garden Abundance, and a Massage

We have an almost embarrassing abundance of flowers in the yard at the moment. The roses are going haywire, exploding like a big ol' Fourth-of-July fireworks display. The beach asters, like the one above, are glowing highlighter-pink. The blackberries are buzzing with bees. We have purple spikes of sage, purple Chinese foxglove, purple clematis, purple chives and scabious, pink persicaria, and orange geums. There are buds on the lilies, the thistles, the geraniums and the hydrangeas. It's crazy.

At times like this, I don't know how we ever survived in a high-rise apartment with no garden.

I spent yesterday dead-heading roses, running errands and reading, mostly. I took Olga to Hampstead Heath for a few hours and then got a massage in the afternoon -- the last of the five that Dave bought me for my birthday way back in November. I'm so glad to be done with them. I mean, I enjoyed them, but I was constantly afraid that something would happen -- the massage therapist would move away again, for example -- and we'd never get our money's worth. So at least that pressure is off!

Also, I'm having the balloon picture reprinted and I'm going to mount it correctly for the photo panel. It was just too crooked.

I didn't take photos of Olga yesterday at the Heath -- I left my camera at home. But here she is at the cemetery over the weekend. No sense of decorum!