My GPS Camera Phone

About a month ago, I found these flowers along the fence at my kids’ school. The interesting thing about them is that they were the only things blooming – everything else had already bloomed, including some flowers just like them. They’re long gone now.

In other news, I’ll be reviewing yet another camera phone. This one is a super-sweet Nokia 6650 that’s GPS enabled, so I’m bound to enjoy testing it. Maybe I’ll actually shoot some photos and post GPS coordinates, considering that my blog title implies GPS photography. (I sort of dropped the ball on that part.) There will also be a mini-site featuring yours truly, but that hasn’t gone live yet. I’ll keep you posted.

You’re thinking, “What’s with the plant? I thought it was a day at the museum?”

The family and I went for a trip to the Samuel P. Harn museum of art located on the University of Florida campus for a few hours of browsing and some interactive Japanese ink drawing. the courtyard in the middle of the museum provided some great shots, more of which you will see in upcoming days. Tomorrow is the last day of Sepia Week and I couldn’t be happier. This camera phone sepia filter is terrible.

The ginger in the front yard is going crazy this year, blooming all over the place. Here’s an overhead shot of four bulbs, with three of them flowering. When they’re done flowering, the bulb gets full of a clear liquid that has a light perfumed scent – it smells amazing. From what I’ve read, awapuhi can do all kinds of things, from curing a bad stomach to washing hair.

I chose this photo crop because the green part of the plant commanded so much attention. Although it’s not the best crop, I felt like keeping the leaves because they looked so healthy. When this stuff dies off in the fall, it’s not pretty, so I’ve got to enjoy it now.

Happy Friday!

Last year, I was carefully watching the pinecone ginger in my yard, hoping to catch it in bloom. Unfortunately, the blooms never came or they were camera shy. Regardless, I never spotted them and decided to wait it out another year.

The past few days have seen some action with the ginger bulbs coming out, but nothing blooming. This morning, I caught one with a single bloom on the side. Given all of the waiting, I wanted it captured in high-resolution, so I broke the rules of the blog and made this new category. I have to say, it really looks good coming from a nice camera. I hope that Susie has a moment to stop by and see it. She was looking forward to it last year, but it never appeared. The photo may be a year late, but better late than never.

A tragic thing happened when I got home from work. The agave bloom broke in half. (The mother plant is on the left, with the stalk rising up out of the frame. I don’t think I need to point out the top half of the stalk.)

An agave plant across the street had finally bloomed after 35 years of growth. During that time, it had propagated many more plants around it, but no blooms. Unexpectedly, a stalk rose from the center and into the air about 20 feet. It was huge and covered in little flowers-to-be, waiting to show off its rarely seen display, after which it would die with dignity. A single, immense bloom followed by death.

The stalk had to grow through the branches of a well-established cedar before it was in the clear, which normally wouldn’t have been a problem. However, the stalk grew too close to a branch which ended up rubbing against the stalk, eventually weakening it to the point of breaking.

I had planned on posting some photos of this magnificent plant in full bloom, but it is not going to happen. Not naturally, anyway. Nancy suggested that I cut the stalks of unopened blooms and place them in water. Hopefully, the blooms will sense their accelerated death and open up for us, in spite of being separated from the plant.

There was a similar instance of this death blooming in my yard, where a morning glory vine was chewed apart (by a dog) at its base, killing the vine. It seemed as if the vine knew it was going to die, so it expended every bit of stored energy to push out the flowers, a blooming period that lasted about a week. It was truly an amazing thing to see – a dead vine covered in bright blue flowers.

I’ll keep you posted as to the success or failure of the rescued agave blooms, but until then, follow the link below to see a good photo of a similar plant getting ready to bloom. I can assure you, if the buds do open, there will be hundreds of yellow flowers posted here. Then, the mother can admire her work from across the road, knowing that 35 years of waiting was well worth the effort.

More info on Agave americana via Floridata.com

Not long ago, I posted the first black-eyed susan bloom in my makeshift flower garden. I thought you’d like to see a LOT of them in bloom. Enjoy!

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