I have got to get myself some of those mosquito fish (gambusia). Nobody seems to have them here. Also, I know killifish would work, but I might as look for a reincarnation of The Great Pumpkin. It's frustrating when you know about stuff but can't find somewhere to buy it.
Take care, all.
Sylvain.
The coconut wireless - chat thread
Sylvan - Be glad you don't live in Mexico. kb
Good morning. Spent yesterday at the Ranger's baseball game with our son and his daughter. Couldn't have been better.....well maybe if all of you had been there with us.
I go to a couple of Royals games a year. The games aren't worth mentioning but it's fun watching the fans there. lol
How right you are, Pepper. The people are always the best show of all. If everyone that was walking around the stadium had come inside......there would have been waaaay tooo many. Pandemonium. Saw some things I could hardly believe. Even the zoo isn't that good. hahahaha
Aloha all,
Just catching up on all the news after some extra days at work this week...off now until Sunday, thank goodness!
Happy, so nice to "see" you here! I am glad Sylvain invited you over - He always makes me laugh imagining him with his Liberace candelabra in a lightening storm!
RJ, the garden looks so nice even though you have "cut back" on the plants! Nice to hear that the tree fern continues to prosper.
PK, nice that you had a good outing with your son and family. Are you still going to do garage sales with what's left of MIL's stuff? It must be very exhausing. I have started to weed out some of my extra kitchen things as I will probably never have a family of 8 to cater for again, and I have been taking the dishes and things to a consignment store and I am rather pleased to have made quite a bit of cash on them. The more ordinary things go to the Kidney Foundation which is one of the only charities that do a monthly pick up here on Maui. Sad to see some of the things go in a way.
I haven't had much time to look around the garden this week but the starfruit tree is blooming again - I guess we will have fruit in a month or so. Four crops a year from that beast, hundreds in each cropping. A friend just told me about a hedge made from Starfruit trees in my neighborhood - of course I had to check it out and it was very pretty with the nice fine foliage that the starfruit has.
I can smell the coffee tree blooms coming in the window this morning, such a lovely scent. Coffee does not do very well for me in my area but we do have three in the garden, although we do not harvest the berries to make the coffee.
This morning I have to deal with a pile of Mango that Frank picked yesterday. There is just so much we can eat, freeze and give away (everyone else's trees are producing too) so I am planning on dehydrating them so that I can send a box to the grandkids on the mainland. Such a messy job and orange fingers afterward are a given.
I just found out that I am going to need to have cateract surgery at the end of June - that can't possibly be me, cataracts are for "old people" LOL! I think it's about time I started acting my age, not my shoe size! Everyone tells me that it's not bad but I am still very leary of anything to do with my eyes. The plus is that I will have perfect sight, at least in one eye. My daughter Laurie is planning on coming out for moral support - she said she was just looking for an excuse!
My big plans for the day include rewiring my watering system that has quit working since we were tented. The valves are working okay, the timer is registrating, so that just leaves the wiring - maybe the connections were broken when they chucked that heavy tarp on top of them - wish me luck, I hate working with electricity!
Hope you all have a happy day,
Jenn
Jenn,
I am a retired OR Nurse and did a lot of eye surgical procedures. One surgeon in particular will not operate with out me in her room on Tuesdays. Cataract surgery is much improved and takes 15-20 minutes procedure time. You will be discharged 30-45 minutes after surgery. What lens are they implanting?. Good luck to you. Belle
Guess who got a package yesterday? All looks well and is currently soaking up a little water before being planted. I can close my eyes and visualize your garden and just where each cutting originated. We had yet another sale. This time at our house and the turn out was dismal. Spent yesterday re-packing everything and took a good deal of it to the thrift store. There is one in our community that is run by young people who are mentally challenged. It is a very happy place. Mike has one more pickup truck load still at his mother's house. Mostly very large items that have been spoken for that we will deliver elsewhere. The buyer is stalling and we are at a loss as to why. Mike and his mother are extremely anxious. I have adopted an attitude of "all in good time".
We have a substantial escrow from him that won't be returned so I am just waiting.
A glorious day to all of you, my friends!
Here is my newest addition to my collection of adenium obesum (desert rose). It's called Santa Claus. It features a red double flower with white markings. I like it. Gail loves it.
Adenium obesums are very addictive, for some reason. What started out as a rescued plant has turned into a full ménagerie of those caudiciforms. When I got home with the first rescued one, Gail said in a tone of voice that left no room for interpretation: "You paid $6 for THAT!!!???". I had no choice but to hang my head in shame and mumble "Yes". She thought I was going soft in the membrane. Now, they're very dear to her heart, too. It's so nice to grow old and soft in the membrane together.
Take care, all.
Pu'ole, a.k.a. Sylvain.
I love you AND Gail.
I would happily give up the desert rose I currently have for that one. Gonna have to find a place that has it and get one. It's gorgeous!!
I got my package a few days ago. Was super excited and got them planted immediately. I can't wait til they take off.
Beautiful adenium, Sylvian. I have one that I got at Walmart tha's been blooming for about a month. I also have some little plants I started from seed. I've had a hard time getting Tony to underwater them. I showed him some that have shriveled up from too much water and I think he's got it. Not a big deal as he is so much help in so many ways.
We got the van filled with old tires today. We also have a couple of trail loads of palm logs from earlier in the week. And a big pile of soil from when neighbor Tom had our shared road/driveway backhoed. Tony and I are are like a couple of kids with lots of stuff to play with. We are having some of our best weather now and I'm much more mobile now that my foot is better so we're having a good time.
Flame trees are in full bloom in town. Starting to bloom where I am Lots of plumarias blooming.
We had twelve hawks circling the arroyo west of us today. There are two nests on telephone poles. All the songbirds stay near my house cause I have so many trees and bushes which protect them. They are hard on some of my little plants but I like waking up to their cheerful singing. I protect what I can with old fan covers. I got a big bag of sunflower seeds to plant. Have to see if any survive to grow.
hugs, katie
good morning.
Katie, don't know about your area but sunflowers of every description spring up all over the place. Especially where there is any building and the soil has been disturbed. I have had them as volunteers as the birds drop them from the feeders. Got to be a problem with 7 feeders going year around so now we "cook" the seed to keep it from germinating. Most bird seed is not particularly compatible with my flower garden.
Got pots and soil yesterday for the cuttings I got from Jen. Going get them going today so I can sit them out in the rain. YAY!!! RAIN!
Morning all,
Thanks for your reassurance Bellieg, I am not sure which lens they are implanting except they will be mono-something. The Dr said that the ones that have tri focal? have given some people problems and he thinks the mono's are a better choice? I had my eyes measured yesterday and had an EKG done. Found out that I have had a heart attack in the past - unbelievable - can't possibly be me!
Lovely desert rose Pu'oke - I can see why they are addictive.
Happy to hear you were getting some rain yesterday PK, I thought that maybe you were in that band of severe weather that was going up the middle of the country again. Did you catch any of it Pepper?
Well, I rewired the watering system and it works like a dream - thank goodness! It took me a couple of hours as I kept cutting off the wires instead of just stripping them, buying a stripping tool would have probably helped but I didn't have one about my person at the time so I used scissors and found out it takes a very gentle touch! You can't go at it like a bull in a china shop. I am very pleased to have that done.
Off to the beach for a short time this morning to talk story with friends - always enjoyable!
It's going to be another pretty day - here is a pic of early yesterday morning from the Dr's parking lot...
And this morning from our house - it's going to be a beaut!
I had two catarac surgeries about seven or eight years ago with no complications. I use reading glasses from the 99cent store. No problems driving or gardening. They gave me a plastic card that says what the lens is but it's outside in my purse.
Tony and I took down a section of tire wall and are laying out tires in accordance with what I envisioned yesterday. It is looking very good. We are both delighted that after five or six years of a little work here and a little there and never being real happy with the results that things are coming together in a big way.
Wish my body was more able to keep up with my ideas but I'm grateful when I can help even a little for a couple of hours. I'm getting lots of seeds started so's to have plants for the arroyo. Lots of them will have to wait until fall as our hot weather will be here in a month or less.
hugs, katie
We got some weather yesterday but it wasn't nearly as bad as they had predicted.
Thanks Jenny.
Spent the day watering as our 30 percent chance of rain dried up. Did some trimming in the front garden as it is already getting shaggy. We need rain. I think we should build pipelines around the country like they do for oil, so we can pipe in the water from the flooding places!.
Strophanthus preussii - Poison Arrow Vine
I moved my metal sculpture flowers to the front today. They have been there before. They were kind of lost in the back so moved them again. The have a giant chain and padlock around the base.
Some Texas Clematis, bell shaped
the ever invasive clerodendrum bungei getting ready to bloom
they are nice when blooming
The sculptures look great there on the porch!!
I have been pretty busy today. We babysitted my nephew today, who's 3 and a major handful and went to a benefit breakfast for a local officer who had been shot in the line of duty I think it was 2 years ago now. He sustained alot of damage and recently had to have the leg that had been shot amputated. Medical bills are major so the area is pitching in to help him. My nephew even got to meet him and got to learn that he didn't have to be afraid of him and his leg. Super nice guy and I am glad we went and helped contribute.
Then we had a grad party for a friend this afternoon so spent a few hours there this afternoon. My nephew found some pudldles and promptly got dirty, wet and stinky!! LOL. We had a good time though. Now just sitting here watching local weather people talk about multiple funnel clouds and tornadoes in Kansas ans Missouri though well north of me.
RJ, you brought two bungei to me and I now have some 25. Have been giving them away and when I dig one, two more appear. All are loaded with buds and I love them.
Hi, everyone.
I thought I'd peek in here while my morning pot of elixir of life (coffee) is brewing. It should be done soon. I'll have my habitual very large pot to your health in a few minutes. My first thought this morning is that I had survived the end of the world. I also thought that I had expected to be the end of the world to a bit more chaotic. I never even realized it was going on. Maybe I should check the news before I jump to conclusions. I'm quite sure the rest of the planet is still there.
Randy, those poison arrow vines are delightful. I have got to look them up. That would be an interesting addition to my vine trellis where a passiflora foetida is currently trying to take over our little house. It would be fun to plant them together and see who wins; not to mention that the blooms are very interesting.
I purchased a very handsome alocasia and a newly hybridized philodendron directly from the hybridizer in Homestead on Wednesday. I had been to his place a couple times, but he was never there. On those previous visits, they couldn't sell anything in his absence because a lot of that stuff had just come back from the tissue culture lab. They just didn't know what could be sold to the public. It helped to speak to the Grand Poobah. We got along very well. I like people who get a twinkle in their eyes when they speaks about aroids. I love aroids. Well, I love anything that readily grows large leaves without having to water it with Holy Water from the Pope's private koi pond.
Coffee is ready. Have a great day, everyone.
Pu'ole, a.k.a. Sylvain.
I loooove your style!
Been dealing with tornadoes around here. The front appears to have moved east some now so I should be in the clear but we had a funnel cloud just north of me and it eventually became a small tornado about an hour later. Still under a tornado watch but for the most part in the clear. Had a hail storm at one point too. Got a bit of damage to the truck but with some touchup paint I can take care of it.
There's some fruit news here. I have one little fig on one of the two fig trees that I've had for five or six years. I've given away rooted cuttings which have produced but this is the first for me. There is also a papaya turning yellow on the tree which I gave neighbor Dana. Since she and her husband Tom are back in Washington for the summer and Tony is taking care of their place we will get to share it.
Tony just called and he has to take his son Antonio to the clinic in Santa Rosalia tomorrow for a problem with his foot. I did odds and ends today and will probably do more of the same tomorrow. I am enjoying our spring-tinto-summer weather, especially in another month or so we will be in survival mode with heat and humidity.
I have a bunch of little arhat plants and I'm researching where they might grow best. Not a lot of information out there.
Scout the visiting dog is now part of the family. Jon may come back someday but we're not holding our breath. Scout like to bark at night with Amber and Jenny. I'm glad they're bonding but wish they'd be quieter about it. I usually put out three containers of food for them That's enough that everyone can eat without fighting. It is funny to see them go from one bowl to another just to see if some are better than others. Like they sniff bones before taking them - like wine connessours.
I've been dealing with pain and I have news: pain sucks. It adds to both depression and tiredness. I can work a few hours a day now - I think - but my mind is fuzzy and I have to be very careful. My house doesn't look like much - as neighbors Dana and Tom would be quick to tell you - but, as Tony and I would tell you we have made huge improvements and we're delighted with things here. The house is liveable. There is a lot of shade (which we have worked for and whhich Dana envies). Lots of fenced areas for the dogs to play. Nice since I can't walk them.
I could spend my time dusting or enjoying. I mostly choose enjoying.
I've had to take more pain killers than usual today but they are finally working. I should be able to sleep.
Lots of little plants coming up and lots more seeds to plant - later.
hugs, katie
Oh wonderful! The buyer for MIL's house has finally called the title company and set things in motion. Possibly close by Friday or Monday.
Great news, Christi.
Tony has gone to take his father to the local clinic. He has to take Antonio to Santa Rosalila for another x-ray of his foot.
Our weather is beginning to warm up a bit but it's still very nice. We are getting what we can done on the arroyo while it is still cool enough to work down there. It is on the west side of the property and really heats up in the summer. One thing we are doing is maximizing what shade there is and putting in more heat and drouth tolerant trees to eventually get more shade.
Tony got some 1/4 inch wire in Santa Rosalia - about $9 per yeard. Yikes.
I'm doing laundry. Tony did the dishes before he left to take his father to the clinic. The man knows how to soften me up.
I am enjoying our beautiful weather.
hugs, katie
P.S. Scout the visiting dog seems right at home now.
Christi, I hope you are taking shelter from the storm!!
wish you'd send a storm my way Christi!
The giant Gerbera daisy decided to show itself this year!
Hey pepper, I think you and I both live in tornado alley. My son lives in Tulsa (when he is not traveling for his company) and he is in Wichita, KA this week. Last week he was in Joplin and the hotel he was in is no more. He has many friends in Joplin. communication there is still sketchy so he doesn't know who was involved or not. Last night looked like we were truly gonna get it. Two funnel clouds to the west and east of us. Thank goodness they didn't touch down. Today is bright and beautiful. We are blessed. RJ, you definitely don't the kind of storms that have been through here. Observation here: have always been told that lightening would activate the nitrogen....two nights in a row we have had severe thunder storms......I think the grass grew two inches in that time. The other plants are greeeeen. We didn't get that much rain, just high winds and lightening.
That's interesting about lightening activating nitrogen, I'd never heard that but it sure seems true. Stay safe all of you up where the tornados are, very scary.
We had alot of funnel clouds and tornadoes in our area today. Around 10 am or so they issued a tornado watch and not 2 minutes later tornado warnings. From then on til about 3pm it was a very active and very scary situation with absoutely no one safe around here. I spent an hour in the basement waiting out the storms. I would think the warnings would be allowed to expire and a new cell would pop up and be rotatiing. Tornadoes did touch down in Louisburg, KS and Sedalia, MO. Sedalia suffered quite a bit of damage to the south side of town.
Here is a link to pictures of Joplin. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1389737/Joplin-MO-tornado-At-89-dead-twister-cuts-4-mile-swathe-Missouri-town.html
Amanda, my son is in Wichita today and he said he stayed in a customers storm shelter for a couple of hours. I know he would have been big brave Marcus if his customer hadn't insisted. I pray you and your family are safe. This year has been a big baddy for natural disasters. Only thing man has absolutely no control.....weather. One way Our God has of reminding us He is omnipotent.
Take care, sweetheart.
It was a wild day for sure. I've never seen a situation where so many towns and counties had to take shelter all at once.
We are safe here. The tornadic activity is done for the night and we are just getting rain.
Oddly, we have had extreme thunder and lightening the last two nights but NO RAIN. How strange.
Rain, hail, you name it we had it. lol. No flooding yet though. If doesn't quit raining we might. Creeks are running a bit high.