FMM - Toes and More!

I finally got my first pedicure of the year - yes, YEAR, thanks to losing a toenail in January after running the Houston half marathon.  I was very paranoid about exposing the skin on that toe to anything that might cause an infection, and it took this long for enough of the nail to grow back.  In the meantime, the place where I used to go did a big renovation and got all new massage chairs, so that was a pleasant surprise when I went in.  Here's my feet, looking sandal-ready (not that I haven't been wearing flip-flops - this Cali girl will always be wearing flip-flops):

A woman at the drying table complimented me on the blue and asked what the name of the polish was - I said I didn't know, I just picked it because it matched my car.

Wasn't even kidding...and if OPI made a Mini Cooper colors set, I'd probably buy it!

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I was sitting and knitting on Tuesday afternoon when the power went out.  It was 97 degrees, but it felt even worse:

I checked the city's online power outage map (thank goodness for smart phones - we now have access to the rest of the world even with no electricity) and there was a pretty big area out...turns out a pole was knocked down during some construction happening down the road from us.  Two hours later, our power was restored, whew!  Not only was it getting warm because of no A/C running, but not having the ceiling fans to move air was especially bad.  We ended up leaving to have dinner in a cool restaurant and then ran some errands to give the house time to cool down before we came back home.  Times like this are when I cannot fathom how people used to live here before the invention of air conditioning...they did this all the time, for months on end.  Heartier stock than I, that's for sure!

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This isn't blooming anymore, but a week ago, it was spectacular:

Texas Mountain Laurel

This year it must have gotten enough rain at just the right time, because it bloomed like crazy!  

In other news, my bougainvillea still isn't blooming, despite fertilizer, full sun, and plenty of water:

Lots of leaves.  Pay no attention to the overgrown grass; our yard guy is coming today.

New growth, but no blooms.  What.The.Heck.

This would look so pretty with the green leaves and pink blooms next to the white brick post - never has a plant let me down so much.  I swear, if this thing doesn't bloom, I'm going to write off bougainvilleas - at least while we live here.  There's still a few months remaining of full sun for it to redeem itself, but if it's not blooming in July, I don't think there's much hope.

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We have no plans for the weekend beyond our usual running and breakfasting with friends, although we need to weed the front flower beds.  Of course, it's a wee bit hot, so finding time to do that when the sun isn't burning down on us will be a challenge; there's probably a small window between sun baking and mosquito biting in the evening that we'll have to jump at.

Have a great weekend!