Multitude of Pink (and 2025)

I am really sorry I've left you picless for so long! You are not forgotten or abandoned and I've thought of you often (some singularly and some in the plural). This year has just relentlessly thrown A Lot of Very Difficult at me and has been exceptionally draining. Just thinking about allthethings makes me need to go for a good long lie down, but I have thankfully had days and even the odd week of respite sprinkled in between. And my sense of humour has proven to be pretty darn robust, dark and ironic as it is, so even as my functional capacity and strength dwindles, my Cheerful Optimism™ somehow keeps refueling my hopes.

And I've even managed to take (just!) enough photos for a calendar this year! I've been vacillating about producing one till now, uncertain about my ablity. But I've received a number of requests for a 2025 calendar, and I would really, really like to produce it, so I think I can pull together the required oomph! It will just be really helpful if I know roughly how many people are keen, so if that's you, please reply and let me know how many you think you might like to order. (Soon! It's only just over a month till the new year! Yikes!) Thank you!

And for this week's month's season's pic, have some pink satyrs:

These flamboyant orchids usually need to push through the coastal fynbos to be seen, and every year I've only seen a few peeking out here and there (if you look carefully you'll notice the odd bit of pink scattered up the hillside) ...

... but the fire in Januay on the western end cleared the vegetation so we can see just how many there are! And since this would be a once-off opportunity, I gathered up all my wherewithal and went to say "hi!" and they all posed so beautifully for me:

It's impossible to capture the sheer awe-inspiring multitude of them in a single photograph or even in a video, because they extend right across the slope, but I took a 360° video nonetheless, which you may enjoy viewing on Vimeo here:

~

May this week bring you generous dollops of pretty pink Happy, in whatever form it takes!