Shopping best times

What times do you like to best do your shopping ?

Is it in the daytime or at night ?

Is it when the shop doors open and you like to rush in and see what new produce the stores have for you ?

Or do you like to do your shopping late at night, like after 11 pm ?

Do you enjoy watching people as they shop and wonder about the things they buy, the families they might have at home, who gets to eat the food they have stacked onto their trolleys ?

Speaking of trolleys, do you take a trolley with you as you shop and enjoy putting things into your trolley as you see them or because they might look good in your home ? Do you wonder at the shopping counter, how these things got into your trolley and what you were thinking of when you put them in ?

Or, do you prefer to go light when shopping, with just a shopping bag ? Or maybe you like to shop with your hands, grab-and-go ?

Which is the best way and time of shopping for you ? Finally do you like shopping ?

I enjoy a good shop and am an enthusiastic shopper. Some days would find me running about a supermarket like a crazed woman, as though a curfew is about to be called and I need to stock things before the shop closes. Some days would find me dull and very utilitarian in my shopping outlook- buy only what I need.

I have come home after a shopping expedition, wondering what I was doing with that thing I purchased or how I was going to use it. It seemed so good to me when I bought it but now I can’t find a use for it.

But the one thing I have learnt about shopping over the years is that I like to shop when the crowds are less. These are the times, I can think about what to buy and what not to buy, rationalize on the costs, the need and the purposes of my buys. I enjoy these solitary soliloquies.

To this end, my best times for shopping are early on in the day or very late at night when people are in bed, the roads are less crowded and so are the shops. Similarly I like to shop at the end of a month, before pay cheque day because that is when the crowds are less in the shops and I can shop to my heart’s content.

Are you a fastidious shopper ? Do you think about when to shop and what to shop ? ARE the times of the day important for you when you shop ?

 

Nature Walk- after rain

I decided to walk around the site of my College today. It rained last night, heavy in parts. The temperature held on- so we had a very pleasant night’s sleep, punctuated by the pitter-patter of raindrops falling on the Air Cons.

I was grateful for the chance to walk around campus, on a very moderate day, no rains but the cloudy sky foretells perhaps a few drops of rain later on in the afternoon. I saw something on my walk, which confirmed my feeling that there would be more rain today.

 

I saw a little May Fly- the first I have seen in many years and I remembered my biology lessons of at least 30 years ago- a May Fly brings rain with it. Seeing this little one, thrilled my heart. Unlike so many others, I love the rain and look forward to it, even in the middle of Winter.

Further along my walk, I saw these little yellow flowers, which grow so well in our gardens here and can cover up any grassy weeds we have in our flower-beds. I am not sure what this plant is.

Beautiful grasses framing the roads of the parking lot.

 

I took a picture of the overcast sky, which seemed clouded and happy altogether. Notice our college building, after the overnight wash. It is smiling too !

Don’t you agree, there is more rain to come ?

More yellow flowers and shrubs, which need a lot more of water to show their true green colours.

Seems to be a day for yellow !

And just when I thought my hour long walk could not have become better, I found these lovely pink flowers with their delicate perfume, filling the air.

 

Finally, I saw a differently hued flower, a small Gulmohar plant, called Flame of the Forest, which lines our avenues and highways. This one was a baby but holding its own with its orange and yellow flowers.

It struck me that this was perhaps the only plant on my nature walk that I was able to identify. So much for being a Science student.

I enjoyed my day outdoors and hope you all have a wonderfully refreshing day as well.

Susie

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Cuttings and “leaf”-ings

I had beautiful roses this year on my peach  coloured rose plant. This plant is at least 4 years old. It is a survivor. Each summer it dies away ( literally) and we despair, only to find it putting out new leaves in the beginning of October and lots of lovely, peach coloured rose flowers by December. A little bit of rose fertilizer goes a long way towards producing abundant  flowers.

 

In December,  I took a cutting from this plant and cut the end in slant. I propped it in a potting soil in a planter . For days and days, even months, there was no sign of life in my cutting. I was disappointed. In my home country, we often grew roses like this, why not here ?

 

Until, last week I noticed, one of its wrinkled and withered away stems was turning green. A few days later, along with some spring rains, the plant grew a whole branch of 5 beautiful green leaves.

 

There is no happiness than seeing one of your seedlings or cuttings taking root and leaf-ing.

New life, new beginnings.

Please help me identify these flowers

Because I have so less free ground space around my house and because the weather is so good, I grow flowers mostly in pots on my terrace( roof). I started planting in October last year and finally in March of this year, with the Spring rains, the seeds have started showing their flower power.

But I can’t identify some of the flowers that have grown in my pots.I am putting them up here, so my gardener friends can help me identify them.

Here they are :

I want to know what these maroon and yellow flowers are.

They have a pretty pink cousin too !

What are they ?