After coming home from work today, I wound up doing some things around the apartment and packing stuff and cleaning and talking with amberfox before I got a chance (and the nerve) to go out and deliver my holiday gift.


Note that this is the actual entire plant in a pot, not trimmed and dying flowers. I was wandering around Trader Joe's looking for a smaller yellow rose in a suitably non-mushy container when I picked up this one to just check on the price -- and the flower stayed in my arms the entire trip around the store, and I chatted with it as I looked about to see where they'd hidden the good chocolate-covered cherries.

It's very odd when you aren't used to listening on that frequency of the Speech.

The yellow rose is the flower of friendship. Darkside's mother answered the door. She went off to extract her son from his room; I hid behind the rose. I didn't stay very long. He hopes he won't kill this plant. His mother, the romantic, attempted to connive to leave us alone by disappearing. When she re-appeared (thanks to a grumpy husband) she issued the subtle hint that Darkside should show me the new lamp in his room. (???) Darkside and I wound up standing outside, instead, as I was ostensibly leaving. We swapped work tales of questionable woe and horror and humor.

Life is good.

I grew very tired on the trip back, and finally traced the problem down to the runaway bond again. His headspace was creeping into mine; I'd become very unguarded in his actual physical presence, and the mind-walls start to thin, then.