Poir-fect Pear: Packham's Triumph

My mother just told me she thought my photograph was Poi-fect. I think she meant it to be like a Three Stooges thing... but to me (and my weary, pear-researching brain) it came off as a hilarious play on words, using the French word for pear - Poire. I'm not sure if this is an indication of my over-zealous nature, or my lame sense of humor...

Anyway, I began playing with photographing some of the few antique varieties that I have access to in this off season.

The first that I managed to find was the Packham's Triumph pear, a cultivar introduced in 1896 in New South Wales, Australia. I had to run back to the store to grab a couple more last night because the first ones that I had so very carefully picked from the shelf for their stems and leaves had been ravaged by a menacing store employee who, in her OCD rampage, shaved their remaining twigs from their tops as she bagged them. I was livid, in a sort of keep-it-to-yourself-you-don't-want-everybody-to-know-you're-actually-crazy sort of way...

When I went to pick up the new pears, I blurted my story to the guy ringing me up (who was actually in training, the poor chap) and when he and his supervisor made weak and very polite attempts to "connect" and seem interested, I heard myself begin to spout off the history of the Packham's pear to them and instantly knew I'd begun to edge toward crazy-pear-lady-status. I stopped, almost mid sentence, to spare them the bulk of my mania. My brother, who had been standing on, said later that he was proud of me for stopping myself... and something to the effect that he was sure I was going to be that guy's "First day at work, is everybody this crazy?" story.

When does a project go from "project" to "obsession"? Hmm... food for thought.

Having actually started accumulating fruit and taking photographs as got me so excited for this summer; you have no idea.