Out of Office

#NatureTwinning Part 18

Impala at African Grasslands--Friday, 12/1/17

I loved how this combination of scarf and boots turned out.  It's fun sometimes to wear the "Friday denim" in something other than jeans.

Outfit cost per wear (OCPW): $15.28

These elegant ungulates were some of the first animals we saw on our Zoo Tour (after the meerkats and klipspringers).  I have to admit that generally speaking, hoofstock are not among my favorite exhibits at the zoo, but on this trip, I found myself enjoying them more than usual.  This is a case where I think the extra challenge of attempting to photograph the beasts enhanced rather than distracted from my appreciation of the experience.

Henry Doorly Zoo

Epiphyte Close Up in Climatron--Monday, 12/4/17

Yep, I couldn't resist the opportunity to wear this new short-sleeved top one more time before the weather got ferociously cold.  I highlighted the subtle maroon/burgundy color in the flowers with coordinating blazer and kick-ass boots.  I like how the white piping on the jacket echoes the white outlines on the flowers.

OCPW: $15.84

Epiphytes are cool things that grow on the surface of plants and get their nutrients from the air.  Some of the common types include mosses, lichens, algae, and orchids.  The specimen below is a bromeliad...which may seem totally unfamiliar until you realize that pineapples are bromeliads!  The botanical gardens had a large array of bromeliads in their conservatory.  The more you learn about it, the weirder than natural world gets.

Missouri Botanical Gardens

In other news...At work a few months ago, we were emailed with a new template for our automatic out-of-office messages that includes the phrase "please know that I have received your message," which generated considerable consternation and controversy.  (I mean, come on, *I* haven't received this message at all; my email server did.)  My office mate and I have handled this differently, with her leaving out the offensively inaccurate phrase altogether and with me combining it with the following sentence so it reads "please know that I will respond to your message when I return" in the hopes that it will give an impression to people inside the organization who care about this template the sense that the right words are there while not stating something untrue to people outside the organization (who don't realize that we are using a template and might find the original phrase stupid/weird).

But perhaps I should reconsider this compromise and go full-out existential with my message.