A bed of roses

My marsh marigolds finally flowered this year - beautiful yellow flowers all over our tiny pond. But it looks like the damselfly larvae didn't survive the winter this year. A memory popped up on fb of them emerging this time last year but there's been no sign of them this year - and we definitely saw pairs of adults laying eggs. It was so cold, and the pond is so small, that it froze solid, so I was prepared to be a damselfly-free zone this year. It's still a little sad, though.

Hopefully there will be more eggs laid and the winter won't be quite so cold.

Husband got some quality time with grandson #2 this week while I was in the office. I'm sorry I missed some cuddles but it was a nice Father's Day present for him.

We bought a 'snug seat' for the baby that lets him sit up and see what's going on more than the bouncy chair. Originally, we ordered it in green but then got an email saying it wouldn't be delivered until mid-July(!), so did we want to change the colour to grey or pink. Obviously, we went for the grey one. Got an email confirming the change, then nothing until we got a message from daughter saying it had arrived. Don't think we'll be using 'Baby Planet' again. I only went with them this time because I got an extra 10% off for signing up to the newsletter, which pretty much covered the postage.

I thought the telly in our room, which is where I do my gaming, was on the blink. The screen was fuzzy and flickery. The downstairs telly isn't the best but works, so I was prepared to get a new one for downstairs and bring the other up upstairs. Then I tried changing the HDMI cable - and it worked perfectly. So, no need for a new telly, just yet. No idea how long we've had the one upstairs but it works :) And it may be old, but FFXVI still looks amazing on it.

I have calmed down a tiny bit now that I've played the demo - but I am still very excited to play the whole game. I'm going to try downloading it Thursday night, but it may have to wait until Friday morning when I'm WFH. The PS5 doesn't always want to play with our wifi - no idea why when every other gizmo in the house is perfectly happy with it - so sometimes it needs supervision :D

The news of a FFX remake is... interesting. I'm more motivated to play it than I am with FFVII, but probably not more motivated to buy it. A remake of FFVIII, of course, would be a VERY different story. Just sayin', SE!

And that's about it for this week.

 My calendar looked ridiculous at the start of the week but a couple of cancellations made it manageable.  One of the things that slipped in to one of the gaps was my annual appraisal.

I am a big supporter of the process - reflecting back and planning forward are things I approve of.  But the form always feels a bit like a school report, and the older I get, the weirder that feels.  My line manager is about my age, too, so in most ways our relationship is one of equals - and then there's this...

Anyway, my objectives from last year weren't really fulfilled - but largely because, I now realise, the objectives themselves were rather wooly.  They were mostly, 'Rosa will do aspect x of her JD' - which... well... yeah... that's my job.  This year's are better, I think.  Except one that I've asked to be rewritten.  We'll see how it goes.

Also did some more shopping for Number 2 Grandson <3  Mostly practical (baby bath, nappies) but also some cute bath toys.  It's all feeling very real :D

And two of my colleagues are expecting babies in December.  The world is awash with cuteness.

Oh, I think I still haven't given my final thoughts on Lucifer.  I really wasn't a fan of series 5.  It turned in to the kind of show you'd expect a programme about the Devil would be.  And I missed the investigations in series 6.  But I did like the ending.  I thought it wrapped everything up very nicely.

And now I am back in the nostalgia-fest that is ST:TNG :D