"Comb of honeyed canticles"

A person less calm, flexible, and professional than I would spend this post complaining about long hours, short deadlines, counterparts at other agencies being obstructionist, and the possibility that the London School of Economics secretly teaches 'Special Topics in Interrogatory Obfuscation' to its postgraduates.

I am not going to do that. Instead, I'm going to jump up and down in childish glee, clapping my hands and pointing at my pretty yellow foxgloves. The photo doesn't quite capture the colour; they are the very softest shade of butter yellow, and the reddish bits you see in the lower bells are not speckles on the flowers themselves but the stamens peeking out.



These are the straw foxglove, Digitalis lutea, a different species from the common garden foxglove (D. purpurea) and alleged to be more perennial. (D. grandiflora is another yellow species, showier than D. lutea). I started these from seed a few years ago, though I can't remember exactly how many years (two or three?) or where I bought the seeds. I do know that the fine folks at Monticello sell them, so it's possible I got them there.

I have been trying to get some sewing done, and to write a little bit of a review of the new sewing machine, but, uh ... long hours, short deadlines, obstructionist counterparts, etc. Look! Pretty yellow foxgloves!

J.D. McClatchy