This week is wild azalea season, here in the NC piedmont region. The trees that produce these guys only grow in shady areas around streams. They produce dozens of circular bunches of these flowers, and after the two weeks are up, turn into unremarkable spindly little trees. I think these are my favorite NC flower.

I just got this in a spam. I have no idea what they're trying to sell, but the spelling mistake had me giggling. Right below this (which was embedded in the email as an image, not as Chinese (?) text), is a link to something_lovelyangel_something. So, they were able to get it right in one spot, but not in another. Or maybe it was intentional? Whatever. It amused me. Lovery.

This is wisteria. I'd never seen it until I moved to the south; it's everywhere in the south. It's a vine that grows up and around other trees and plants or buildings, phone poles, etc.. For a couple of weeks in spring, it produces these huge grape-like clusters of perfumed flowers, turning the edges of forests light-purple. If it wasn't for the pretty flowers, though, it'd be just another fast-growing southern vine, taking over everything it can sink its tendrils into.

Here's the infestation where I took the above picture.

For some reason, my little corner of the office smells like someone's cooking Rice-a-Roni nearby. It's smelled that way for hours. I'm starving.

A new game, via Matthew Yglesias: : Caesar's Bath. Here's how it works:

Behold, the Caesar's Bath meme! List five things that people in your circle of friends or peer group are wild about, but you can't really understand the fuss over. To use the words of Caesar (from History of the World Part I), “Nice. Nice. Not thrilling . . . but nice.”

Well, that sounds like fun: a list and an excuse to bitch!

1. College Basketball - Though not for the reason Yglesias gives. I actually don't watch any sports on TV outside of a few Olympic events, the Super Bowl and maybe some of the World Series. I like watching live baseball; Mrs Cleek and I make it a point to catch a game at whatever stadium is nearby when we visit a new city, and we usually do three or four Durham Bulls games every summer; and I like watching live hockey (though I wish it games were a bit shorter). But sports on TV ? And the whole bracket / fantasy league / "remember that one game, from 15 years ago?!" mentality ? Not for me.
2. .Net - Yes, it's nice to be able to use a friendly language like C# instead of an abomination like VBScript. But the fact remains that you're still stuck writing in three languages, in two environments, to do try to do things the web was really not designed to do.
3. The Fiery Furnaces - "How cute and clever can we be before we cross the line into twee ? Well, that was easy! Shall we try for obnoxious ?"
4. Texas Holdem - Sure, it's fun. But is it really the Pinnacle of Poker? Whenever we play, we spend half the time trying to remember the bidding rules and educating the novices on all the silly jargon: "River", "Flop", "Big Blind", "Turn", "Burn em", etc.. And yet, that's all we play when we get together. What ever happened to good ol 5 card draw ?
5. 24 - The first season was good enough. The second season became so unrealistic that it would make me giggle at the sillyness. During the third season turned into a comic book and I stopped watching. Apparently, it's still a big deal - everyone at work can't wait to talk about it.
   

Oh, and then you're supposed to pass it on to three other people. That's tough, since I can't think of three people who read this who have blogs of their own. :)

"AeroSith is a band of costumed Star Wars characters who perform parodies of rock songs but with a comedic twist."

Apparently their songs use actual dialogue from the movies as the lyrics.

mm k

The iPod starts the week with:

1. Townes' Blues - Cowboy Junkies
2. Ride - Liz Phair
3. Djed - Tortoise
4. How To Make A Baby Elephant Float - Yo La Tengo
5. Cluck Old Hen - Allison Krauss
6. Evita - Smaller Animals
7. Mama Cita - Blonde Redhead
8. Here Comes a Regular - Replacements
9. Yuri-G - PJ Harvey
10. Tough Guy - Beastie Boys

So, I think that's 9 songs from 1990-1996 and one from a band that has been declining steadliy since then. Sigh. I do put new music on the thing, but the damn iPod never plays any of it.