Paulownia on a dark and stormy night

I know it’s October when my son celebrates his birthday and the paulownia blooms in the backyard.

A storm battered Melbourne on Sunday night, felling trees, taking out power lines, flooding roads and bringing the trains and roads to a grinding halt on Monday morning. Meanwhile, our paulownia sprinkled a few flowers onto the grass and kept right on blooming. It’s tougher than it looks.

Here it is on Monday night, still going strong in the rain.