My mother had mentioned wanting to go to the Royal Botanic Garden, so, since we didn’t get the chance to go when my parents were here, I went on my own this week. Most of it was in that hibernation state where you wonder if everything just up and died on you over the winter and you’re going to have to replant everything. The most obvious example is the Queen Mother’s Memorial Garden. The actual garden part looked like someone had set up the skeletons of all the bushes and shrubs then went to lunch before putting all the leaves on. And then forgot to come back.

There was, however, a hut/house/thing decorated with seashells, so I took lots of pictures of that.

According to the informational plaque – which I actually took the time to read, wonder of wonders – the shells and pebbles used were collected from the beaches by Scottish school children, which is simultaneously adorable and child labor.

There are a couple streets in New and Old Town that have street venders selling the sorts of things that street venders and farmers’ markets usually sell. I adore farmers’ markets and street venders, so I made sure to take the time to check them out. The merchandise. Not the venders.

A couple of my friends also make sculptures out of soda cans, so this made me think of them. None of this guy’s stuff was made using Irn Bru cans though, which, given where he’s selling his stuff, seems like a rather large missed opportunity. I would have bought something from him if there was Irn Bru stuff, but it was all brands that I could get in the U.S., so it felt like I could just make my own. Or get one of my friends to.

On the way back from the venders, I got stopped by a gentleman from the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, which I’d never heard of before. I ended up having a very interesting discussion with him about what exactly the group was (they’ve got a website, if you’re interested,) but the most striking thing about the conversation didn’t occur to me until later when I was relying the conversation to friends over Skype. If it had been an individual of any Christian denomination that had come up to me I would have just told them I wasn’t interested and been done with it. I try to be open to all religions, so it was a reality check to be presented with an instance of my own religious prejudice.

The week was rounded off with a visit to the National Gallery. This is different from the National Portrait Gallery. There’s also a National Gallery of Modern Art, because things weren’t confusing enough. There were more sculptures there than the Portrait Gallery, which only had a few busts, and the interior architecture was more interesting.

Staircases. Yet another thing to add to the List of Things I Take Far Too Many Pictures of.

I didn’t make it through the whole gallery, but so far this portion of one of the paintings is my favorite. Just because this horse DID NOT SIGN UP FOR THIS.