bush rosemary

  • Suburban Tokyo’s Little Slice Of The Godzone

    Aussies like to call our country the Godzone, a corruption of the phrase “God’s Own Country,” and we’ve been lucky enough to replicate a little bit of that zone in the suburbs of Tokyo. Thanks to the talents of the amazing Alex Endo, Japan’s premier author on Australian plants and designer of gardens using Aussie natives, we have an incredible Aussie garden. Late spring in the lead-up to the rainy season is when the garden puts on its finest show. Nearly everywhere is lush and green. But there is also an explosion of color and beauty as the flowers spring forth. We have the scarlet of the callistemon. The burning…

  • Beautiful Bloomers And A Bevy Of Budding Beauties

    I’m amazed at how much joy our garden brings me when I get to see it upon waking every morning. That is especially so at this time of the year as the flowering plants take their turns to flourish and add some brilliant blooms to the verdant surroundings. Our grevilleas are the big stars at the moment, with their delightful, spider-like flowers. Other trees are not too far away from showing their more flamboyant side, either. The callistemon, lemon myrtle and, if we’re really lucky, one of the banksia also appear poised to bloom. And the bush rosemary still looks glorious after flowering for weeks.

  • Pop Goes The Blister And A Cracker Jaca

    I’m not quite out of action, but not far from it, thanks to popping a tiny blister on my finger over a week ago now. The bloody thing got infected and the infection started to spread up my arm. Pain has been excruciating, which has come as a total surprise considering how small the original blister was, and I have barely slept in a week filled with visits to the dermatologist and being pumped with increasingly large and frequent doses of painkillers and antibiotics. It finally appears as though the drugs are working and the swelling has subsided and the infection beginning to retreat. I’m not the only ailing body…

  • Singing Praises of Unsung Heroes

    May is my favorite month of the year in Japan: it’s generally warm, dry and sunny with long days and the landscape is brilliantly verdant and lush, and that applies to my own garden. We’re only a couple of days into the month, though, so its full effects have yet to show, but that’s allowing lesser lights to take center stage, I realized this morning. Sitting in our living room and looking out into the garden I got to notice how delightful the bush rosemary is with its plethora of dainty little blue flowers. Despite being overshadowed by the bloody neighbor’s ferociously fast-growing bushes that take all the light from…

  • Starred Woes* A New Hope(lessness?)

    I’m deeply grateful to my employer for many years of employment and, perhaps most importantly, guiding me and our family through the COVID-19 pandemic and the gut-wrenching fears it sometimes brought with it, which can be easy to forget now, many years down the track. But my Company has also made me an absolute wreck because it has sanctioned a reign of terror and harassment for the past few years that has deeply eroded by sense of well-being, confidence and savings. Part of the problem is that I am almost inextricably linked to my employer courtesy of having caused very public problems a couple of decades ago that make the…