As I write this...

...I am nursing/scratching my first black fly bite. They are late this season, as is the season itself. Spring just does not seem to want to commit this year, and we have seen cool temperatures, wind, an inordinate amount of rain, and when it's not been raining, it's been gloomily overcast, or else sunny but tempered by an unpleasantly strong and raw north wind.

There is a TV commercial running right now trumpeting the reminder that ''summer is just 95 days long'', with the implicit message to make the most of it. Whenever I see that commercial, I have the urge to throw heavy things at the television. Up here in central Ontario, we are all too aware of how brief the good weather is, and further to that point, how much every good day counts. We have leaves on the trees for just four months...one third of the year. The maples and oaks have only just this week birthed their bright green baby leaves, and by late August those leaves will already be taking on autumn colours.

All of this to say that the late spring, or lingering winter (depending on your glass half-full/glass half-empty perspective) is depressing.

However, the first crop of dandelions has already peppered the grass, and unlike most other people, I love their cheery yellow punctuation, followed by the puffy white snowballs of the dandelion clocks. They are beautiful to photograph in closeup, and they make a lovely bokeh when they take on a background role, as in these photos taken today of the dogs at the park.