My flower vase is filled with Stargazer lilies this week. Stargazers are my favorite lily if not my favorite flower. I looked on the net and found out that they are classified as Oriental hybrids.

Oriental hybrids - These are based on hybrids of L. auratum and L. speciosum, together with crossbreeds from several mainland Asiatic species. They are fragrant, and the flowers tend to be outward facing. Plants tend to be tall, and the flowers may be quite large. An example is “Stargazer”.

Click the thumbnail for a close-up view of my ‘Gazers . . .

No, this isn’t a picture of doggie jail.

A week ago I wrote about our dog, Bear, who loves to be my constant companion. Well, today I got past her once again while she slept and went upstairs. When I came back down, she greeted me as usual and then positioned herself halfway up the staircase to make sure that wouldn’t happen again.

People who are familiar with Windows® operating systems will recognize this “blue screen of death.” I have seen it from time to time when using both home and work computers that both use the Windows OS. What threw me was this one that popped up on - wait for it - the gas pump at a Lomita (CA) Mobil station. It pumped out $2.16 worth of regular gasoline when it did this. I had to move to another pump where I completed my fill-up.

When I checked the credit card charges later in the week, I saw that I got charged the $2.16 for the aborted sale. Weird.

Click for a bigger view.

When we go to the shooting range on the weekends, most of the time, we bring a couple of our shotguns. We both have Remington model 870 shotguns. Verna’s is a 20 gauge ‘youth model’ which has a shorter stock and barrel than my full-sized 12 gauge shotgun. We also share a 12 gauge ’security model’ of the same gun that has a synthetic stock and fore-end, unlike our other guns which have finished wood stocks and fore-ends.

In this video, Verna demonstrates the proper method for discharging five rounds from her 20 gauge shotgun. As you can see, she makes short work of the target and has fun doing it.

Just after midnight this morning, I went out into the yard and got this shot of the cereus in bloom. I liked the orange glow in the background which is city lights reflected off of a cloud layer. Click for closer view.

This is really a colorful print of some Hawaiian Mahimahi (dolphin fish) on one of my dresses. The fiery orange background almost glows in the dark. According to Wikipedia, it is very common to see the word Mahimahi spelled as two words (mahi mahi) or as a single word separated by a dash (mahi-mahi). Each of these variations is wrong. The true Hawaiian spelling of the word is as a single word. the correct spelling is Mahimahi and it is pronounced “ma-e-ma-e.” Click on the thumbnail image for a closer look.

This beauty opened up this week. I love the color of this Santana Hibiscus. We acquired this bush last August from the local garden shop.