The sky had some unique striations in it last night just after the sun had set, and I ran to grab my camera.

Towards the west I took this photo.

Towards the south, the moon was already trying to inch out from behind the fir trees. I wanted to get more pictures of the moon, but just as it came out of hiding, my luck changed. The camera battery went dead. Quickly, switch batteries. But the spare was dead too, so that marked the end of the evening’s photographic efforts.

The next morning I managed to get more photos. The rudbeckia was irresistible.

Then I noticed this very special rose. I’ve had it for about 26 years and never knew its true name. When I bought it, the label said “Tropicana.” Its photo showed an orangey-red flower, but when mine finally bloomed, it was more like the colour of coffee with cream.

For years I thought the rose had been mislabeled but when I did a search for Tropicana, I saw that one or two of the roses were of this “coffee with cream” colour. The rest were the standard reddish orange. So maybe it wasn’t misnamed at all, but was just one of the few specimens with special colouring. And all these years I had wondered about the name of the rose.