Let's end this Friday on a positive note

[cerealjoe]

Ah. Finland. It's almost June and the only way of knowing that is the fact that when I leave work I shortly contemplate just cycling home in a sweater. Then I get outside and unlock my bike and put on my jacket. But hey, it's a very light jacket... and it keeps the rain off, mostly. Still, we're with the times. We have blossoming trees and all. Yeah, the blossom season ended days ago in many parts of the world but we like to take our time.

Last week I actually saw some lily-of-the-valley stems but no flowers, maybe this week they'll be open already! It's kind of strange that those flowers are usually given as May Day presents in France... and here they don't appear till the end of May. All flowers are different though, it's like peonies... in France they're known to bloom much earlier than in Germany where their names, I think, translates to the "roses of Pentecost" (Pfingstrosen) as it's the time they usually bloom there. No idea if it's true or not but a name cannot lie. Then again my German sucks so go figure. Moving on... you know what I like about Finland, besides the weather at the end of May where half the cyclists wear real gloves, it's the fact that nature rules a lot here. Here's a photo of a tree right outside my house:

The grass is cut every week and everything but everything just regrows and it bothers no one! Can you imagine this kind of grassy area full of those yellow flowers that turn into those white puffy things (what are they called again? I really can't find the word) in the middle of the city in Paris? Or that green plant that stings (my knowledge of plant titles in English is amazing, isn't it? I can see the name both in French and Ukrainian but the English one evades me) just living out its life? Yup, life is good. Really, if it weren't for those winter month and that gloom that sets in October, it's hard to find a better place to live than Finland. Yep, yep.