Poppy

For such a common, everyday sort of flower, poppies have a wonderful ability to look absolutely fabulous when planted in a bunch in the garden, or picked and gathered together in a vase. Especially if they include a wide selection of those warm, vibrant yellows, oranges, pinks and whites that poppies insist on dazzling us with.
But if you get up a little closer and more personal to a poppy, you can start to see one of its far less glamorous features. It's like the poppy's guilty secret, rarely acknowledged and never discussed in polite society.
The ugly truth of the matter is that poppies are hairy.
Not hairy as in fine, pale and downy; but as in coarse, black and scruffy.
And it's not just those long, slim, otherwise elegant stems that are hairy. The bud case enfolding the unopened flower is also hairy - and equally so.
When the bud case starts to open up, and the tightly furled petals peek out through the narrow slit, the contrast in colour and texture is so extreme that it's almost comical.
This unfortunate juxtaposition is thankfully short-lived. The whole flowering process - from bud starting to open to full bloom - often takes only 12 to 24 hours.
Which is not that much shorter than the flower's time in full bloom. If you get 2 or 3 days of a poppy in full bloom, you're doing rather well.
You really need to keep an eye on poppies, otherwise you can easily  miss the entire show.