Monkey flower

Mimulus guttatus

This morning I went for an early walk round the reserve.  Some of it's closed as they have sheep munching down the reed beds.  Very weird, haven't seen them in there before, only cattle.  The most exciting part of my walk was seeing a roe deer trailing a tiny kid under her skirts.  Unfortunately she saw me at the same time I saw her and quickly shushed baby back into the reeds.  So sadly no pics, though it was the high spot of my day, confirmation at last that they're back in the public end of the reserve.

So instead of that, here's a blip of some monkey flowers, which are everywhere down in the wetlands right now, looking pristine and gorgeous!  Kind of halfway between snapdragons and foxgloves.  Geoffrey Grigson says they came here from Alaska, though they also grow as far south  as the waterways of New Mexico.  A survivor then.

Am I a survivor?  I'm beginning to doubt it.  The writing side of my life is causing unnecessary pain right now.  Never say you'll do things for other people, you land up doing far more for them than they'll ever do for you ;((  If it wasn't for the large pot of liquorice, peppermint and aniseed tea sitting beside me...

Have a happy/boxset/peaceful (delete as appropriate) evening.  And remember, WFW20_11 finishes at midnight tonight.  From tomorrow the tag is - unsurprisingly - WFW20_12  ;))

xx