Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #148 – Spots and Dots

Ann-Christine has set us the task today of find spots and dots, and shares three examples from the amazing work of Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, whose ‘Infinity Mirror Room’ Installation we saw at the WNDR Museum in Chicago. As we only had a minute in the room, you can understand my slightly demented look as I strove to both enjoy and photograph what was around me. You know how cool it is when you get several mirrors just right to appear to go on forever? Multiply that by a factor of a million and you might be able to imagine this.

My life is a dot lost among thousands of other dots.
— Yayoi Kusama

But let your eyes rest, look at some other examples and enjoy some random dot quotes.

Bird spots and dots and not of the droppings sort…

Purpose is the thread that connects the dots to everything you do that leads you to an extraordinary life.
— Oprah Winfrey

Prickly desert spots and dots…

Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart even when it leads you off the well worn path. ~Steve Jobs

Frozen spots and dots…

Grandchildren are the dots that connect the lines from generation to generation. ~Lois Wyse

And at the other temperature extreme, some almost-boiling spots and dots.

I don’t think Seurat would have been aware of the dots – he would have been aware of what he was trying to do. The dots were an instrument.
— Frank Auerbach

Happy mid-May! I hope wherever you are that you’ve gotten at least one vaccination shot and are able to spend time with friends and family in person.

We interrupt this broadcast

We’ve been walking at the Desert Botanical Gardens, but let’s take a moment to look in our own garden. A year ago, the flowers of the torch cactus welcomed us to Arizona with three different rounds of flowers. Now it’s blooming again. My parents have an enormous one with huge flowers. Ours is small, but also beautiful. Torch cactus come in a variety of colors, which you can see if you click here.

The one on the right will likely be full-blown tomorrow morning. It makes every day an adventure. Until they bloom, the flowers have a rather sci-fi look.

Bees love flowers and this bee was having a good time. But when I tried to get close for a better shot, it would go just inside, then zoom away. This was the best I could do. You can see him at the bottom right, looking a little fuzzy, but then bees are. Just FYI, his antennae aren’t curly, those are dark lines in the flower. It would look pretty cool, though, if they were.

also for Cee’s Flower of the Day

That bloomin’ desert!

I promised you more of the Desert Botanical Gardens and I aim to keep that promise. If Jo’s walking today, this is my walk for her. Although the desert is mostly about cacti (the plural of cactus), and cacti have beautiful flowers, if there’s enough water and the temperature is right, you can get other flowers as well. Outback Steakhouse has their Bloomin’ Onion, but the bloomin’ desert is prettier and has way less calories!!

Although flowers can get up close and personal with cacti, I suggest you keep a respectful distance and always watch where you walk. Here you just have to stay on the path, but if you’re elsewhere, keep your eyes open. As it warms up, you always have to watch for rattlesnakes, not here probably but elsewhere. My husband’s seen several on the path along the canal where he rides his bike. I, fortunately, have yet to have that wonderful experience. I can wait.

We weren’t the only ones appreciating the flowers. The netting’s in place as protection from birds and critters of various kinds who might wish to express their appreciation for what they consider edible flowers and plants in a more destructive way.

It was wonderful to see all the color, but just all the green, whatever its source, was a joy as well. To have both was perfect.

Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #141: Geometry…at home with shapes

Patti has asked us to find shapes this week. I’m sticking close to home for mine, as all are taken in our house or yard. I always enjoyed geometry; in fact I enjoyed math, because everything was logical. Just call me Spock. 🙂 I enjoyed math until I got to trigonometry, at which time I realized that unless I went into math, I probably wouldn’t have any use for it, even for figuring out the width of a creek from the shadow of a tree.

We’ll start with an edible shape, one cherry tomato from my patio plant, sharing shapes with part of our patio table (not edible.)

A shapely part of an aloe plant.

Cacti are made for geometry!

Some early morning geometry, courtesy of the sun and blinds.

Although there aren’t innumerable leaves here as there were in the Midwest, we still get some.

Thus endeth today’s geometry lesson. There will be no quiz and it’s pass-fail, so happy weekend!

Spring green

This is what spring green looks like in Arizona, specifically at the Desert Botanical Gardens in Phoenix. Probably not what spring looks like where you live.

for Life in Colour: green

Opposites

for One Word Sunday: opposites

Upright

for SquareUp 1.26.21

Thursday doors…neighborhood doors

In our neighborhood, doors tend not to be too exciting, as most of them have screen doors on the outside, often with thicker screens called sun screens rather than bug screens to help keep out…you guessed it. Keeping out the sun factors greatly into your electric bills, especially in summer, which runs from temperature-wise from about May-September.

So I’m being creative in presenting these three doors from our neighborhood. I hope you’ll enjoy them. And welcome to October!

This view is unusual in that there’s standing water in the shot, something you don’t often see here. It’s not from rain but from watering the common area in our HOA (homeowners association.)

This one’s for Dan (and the neighborhood children.) The park’s called “Train Park”, possibly named by Captain Obvious. 🙂

Friday flowers…a barrel of flowers

Barrel cactus look a lot like a spiny barrel. No surprise, right? But you might be surprised at how beautiful the flowers are. Yellow and orange are the most common colors, pink and red less frequent. But whatever the color, the flowers only bloom on top of the cactus. Barrel cactus are usually about 3′ or less, although some have been found as tall as 9′. Whatever the height, they can live to be 100 years old.

Fun fact, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Barrel cactus can fall over because they grow based on sun orientation. They usually grow towards the south to prevent surface tissue sunburn, giving the name “compass cactus.”

And here’s my favorite cactus quote:

I bought a cactus. A week later it died. And I got depressed, because I thought, D**n. I am less nurturing than a desert. ~Demetri Martin

As with all cactus, admire the flowers, but don’t forget the spines!

Monday walk…Careful where you step!

Let’s take a closer look at a few of the cacti found in Saguaro National Park. One of the first places to get out and walk that we encountered was a paved loop giving great views of a variety of cacti, a number of which were in flower or had fruit. There’s quite a bit of room between many of the cacti, but be careful where you step and don’t back up without looking!

Here’s a lovely bunch of prickly pear cactus with fruit. Prickly pear jelly can be found in the Southwest and the fruit can be eaten but you have to be very careful to completely removed the outside so no spines of any size are left. I think I’ll stick with jelly!

When I started this post I didn’t realize that cholla, the type of cactus I’m showcasing next, used to be part of the same genus as prickly pear, despite what this information board says, but have now been separated because of some differences we wouldn’t notice, . However, the board does show how important each part of the desert flora and fauna are.

I also didn’t realize that there are boatload of species of opuntia, not a hundred, but a LOT! If you’re interested in identifying the flowers, this is (un)likely to help and made me laugh:

The flowers are typically large, axillary, solitary, bisexual, and epiperigynous, with a perianth consisting of distinct, spirally arranged tepals and a hypanthium.

If you do know what all those mean, do NOT tell us or I will ban you from the blog and flog you with a wet noodle or possibly o-puntia you across the desert for being a showoff!