Food, Flowers, and Festivals = Fun: 2015-05-17, Everything's Coming Up Roses!

It's been a quiet weekend. Nice weather but nothing to do. Yesterday I finally found a reasonably priced vacuum cleaner at a 2nd hand store - and a cake shop across the street from the store. And somehow I completely forgot about my Japanese lesson! That was too bad since I didn't have anything planned for the day.

Today started off with getting up early and joining a neighborhood cleanup. We just pulled weeds and grass at a nearby park. I was hoping to meet some people and make some friends. Don't know what will come to pass, I talked to a couple of people and they know where I live so we'll see.

Can you guess where I went after that?

Shosakai koen

Today I went to the big park that's not too far from work and took pictures of the roses. Some are already finished (the purple ones that smell so sweet), some have more buds than flowers, and some are in full bloom. You really can't get the feel of the place (or smell the sweet fragrance) from the pictures but I wanted to show you some of the beautiful flowers.

I like how they trained these rosed into a tree.

California poppies!

Which were my favorite? It was close - the orange/yellow/red combo took 3rd place, the yellow one's took 2nd (yellow roses were the first flowers I ever received - in a box - from my Grandpa Sol for high school graduation so I have a soft spot for them), and in 1st place the white roses - so beautiful!! But being surrounded by all of them was very special.

It's a big park, there are 3 playground areas and this baseball field
where some children's teams were playing and others were doing drills.

I still had a good part of ther day left and nothing to do so I started riding along this river and met 3 sheep (I forgot to take their picture) who are kept along the grassy area along the hospital parking lot. It seems the Drs. or rehab people think that looking at the sheep from their rooms will be good

therapy for the patients. Although they are so far away I think they would be dots, maybe the idea of

having living animals nearby is enough... I spoke to someone who was feeding them and it seems

they are 'rental' sheep. They go back to the farm when the weather gets cold.

In an interesting turn of events I saw lamb chops at the supermarket (very unusual here)

later that day. I didn't buy them. But actually I didn't think about seeing the sheep,

I just didn't need them at the moment!

And all the rivers lead to Lake Biwa. I found a couple of nice park like grassy areas with benches. Occassionally I'll have to bring dinner to work and go there when I'm done in the summer.

After I find some good mosquito spray.