Of Flowers and Peppermint Tea

A sign that the seasons are a-changing.

Chanced upon Princes Street Gardens today, and was greeted by a lovely sight: the gardens in bloom!




Quite a riot of colours. I'm looking forward to Spring weather.

A quiet and generally uneventful day. But I think the sight of flowers after 3 weeks of dreary weather was somewhat rousing and I might even say...inspiring?

So continuing the resolution I made yesterday (yes I will blog about it soon), I made a conscious decision this afternoon to choose against my natural instincts. The results whilst not dramatic, did beget pleasing results.

So instead of heading back to the Library to polish up my Art history essay, I decided to linger on indefinitely at the Gardens and Princes Street.

And instead of finding some nice heated indoor venue to have my lunch, I decided for once to sit out amidst the lovely flowers with book in hand, whilst slowly savouring my bacon and egg croissant.

Eschewing my natural honing instincts to window shop at Zara, Topshop and H&M, I wandered down one of the sideroads and ended up at a cosy Italian cafe - a warm hamlet filled with the smell of coffee. I sat there in a somewhat sleepy daze, overlooking the crowd down on Princes Street, with Jazz notes happily muffling the sound of the street bustle.

Suspending disbelief, I finally got down to ordering a Peppermint flavoured tea, which I have always predicted would taste of toothpaste. It wasn't as bad as I thought, and proved a satisfying accompaniment to my read.


Well. Not to idealize the day. You know I hate people who romanticize. The sun, having gloriously illuminated the Gardens when I was snapping photos, suddenly decided to retreat behind ominous looking clouds halfway through my croissant.

The book I was reading turned out to be incredibly racist (Prester John, John Buchanan. O.M.G.) and had an appalling ending involving sloppy praise for 'the white man's burden.'

And halfway through my peppermint tea, I began to be tempted by the frothy mug of Hot Chocolate my neighbour was having.

But definitely I would say, one of my better and more restful weekday afternoons so far.