Devenish

It's the Sakura (cherry blossom) season, where every other Japanese person with a camera is out taking pictures of the sakura. And they are indeed wondrous, as these pictures show. But it's Spring for other flowers and blossoms as well, which most people seem to ignore. So while out with Mutley for his afternoon walk — after rain — I took some pictures of the overlooked, but no less beautiful spring shows:

Today, I had an unexpected day off—term, it turns out doesn't start till Thursday, and Julian is still on his winter vacation. For a long time, he's wanted to do the Mentos-in-Coke experiment, which was easy to grant and to facilitate. But I didn't want to mess up the garden, so we took the dog and headed off to the beach at Ashiyayama. It's a beautiful Spring day and the first of the many sakura are out. So everything worked well: not only did the experiment yield the desired result, but we got stunning shots of the blossoms, a near empty beach, and pizza on a terrace afterwards.