The News from South Philly

I'm happy to have gotten some work done the past two mornings, and expect to put in a solid five or six hours today as well before I knock off for a bike ride. The Macy's Flower Show runs till tomorrow, but for me it's over: I photographed Bill Schaffer's arrangement yesterday. I begged off the shoot of the work-in-progress Wednesday night. After doing Michael Bruce's, I was wiped out the next day (and in fact I think being so tired contributed to the lapse in judgment that caused the comic bike crash) and didn't want to repeat the mistake. Bill and Christian took some point and shoot photos and also a video, which made me a little sorry I missed it.

So here's the Macy's flowery goodness for your enjoyment:

On the windowsills, etc.:

• I have a pineapple top rooting in a jar of water (plunged into the water yesterday)
  
• I have more tarragon seedlings than I know what to do with
  
• My Schlumbergera seedlings, planted last spring, have put out a number of full-sized leaves so I think that potting on will be called for very soon
  
• H. 'papilio' x 'emerald' is still showing a fine seedpod and a robust stalk leading up to it so I don't think it will abort. It's starting to show signs that it's going to ripen and split any day now
  
• H. 'appleblossom' x 'gervase' is likewise maturing nicely
  
• H. 'supermarket' x 'papilio' looks a little puny but the stalk is still robust so I don't think it's aborting. Ditto for 'trader joe' x 'papilio'
  
• H. 'trader joe' x 'gervase,' class of 2011, has survived its potting on although some bulbs are sulking and leaves are yellowing -- but only one per bulb and I see some new leaves coming up
  
• the scrap of Dodo's Nopalxochia that I picked up doesn't look terribly promising, but then it also doesn't look any worse than it did two weeks ago, so I'm not giving up on it
  
• I pulled up four seedling maples (cotyledons plus one set of true leaves) from the ground around a little grove of dwarf cut-leaf maples by the Horticulture Center. Two of them show absolutely no signs of shock
  

I am wondering whether any of my hardy hibiscus have germinated yet, but that means a trip to the basement. Perhaps later.

There's a long day stretching ahead of me with no trips to the Convention Center. Oh, I could go over and watch the tear-down, but that's mostly a bunch of sweaty guys moving tons of mulch, pavers, and construction debris and cursing mightily as they load 25' palms into trucks to go to greenhouses etc. It's pretty sad.

I scored a pineapple plant (no idea how to care for it, but I'll figure it out), two sprays of dendrobium, one treated with ammonium sulfate to turn it improbable colors, and a sort of rusty-colored anthurium. Oh, and a piece of wedding cake from this happy couple:



Bill and Kris were married on the Show floor Wednesday night, and the reality TV guy "The Cake Boss" provided the cake. There was a sheet cake for the Wednesday night reception, but the real cake remained on display until the Show closed, when Kris cut it for some of their friends (including Roy and me). She had forgotten to get forks, though, and the cake was replete with chocolate mousse filling, so it was messy. But good. Much more flowery goodness will be posted after I do some real work.

Meanwhile, on the windowsills: both seedpods on 'papilio' are swelling, although they've been known to grow and grow and then abort, or mature but produce only chaff. Downstairs neither of my cross-pollination experiments is clearly successful (this was 'Gervase' x 'Apple Blossom' and vice versa). Perhaps that's just as well, because I'm out of windowsill space. Meanwhile, one late bloomer from the class of 2006, one of the ones I was going to discard, is showing promise of being the pick of the litter. Just goes to show...

All my test herbs have done well, so I may try potting some of them along and growing them out as my backyard herbs for the season. Swiss chard did well, too, but I had it in such a wee pot that it died of thirst during the Flower Show.

Roy is now infected with Flower Show Fever and will be working next year's Show.

My Hippeastrum 'papilio' is almost open for business -- the ladyparts of the first flower are beginning to loosen up and by tomorrow or the next day ought to be receptive. I'll be torn because once I pollinate the plant the flowers will wither immediately, whereas I could probably eke out a couple more days otherwise. Of course, it may not self-pollinate. Some clones do, I'm told, and some don't. I also have pollen from Hippeastrum 'emerald' (not 'evergreen,' as I thought) coming from a friend in Indianapolis. Emerald doesn't look as green as 'evergreen.' Here's a link to a Flickr photo showing 'evergreen' and 'emerald' side by side. There's some color variation in 'emerald' -- some are pinker and some are greener. I hope Rebecca's 'emerald' is more on the green side.

At any rate, here is my 'papilio' in all her back-lit glory.



I've been looking at my other Hippeastrums with a more optimistic eye. Neither the 'Gervase' nor the 'Apple Blossom' appear to be seriously affected by the virus. The Trader Joe NOID, on the other hand, has streaked and deformed leaves, possibly because of the stress of childbearing three of the past six years. All the children look streaky.

More thyme and windowsill basil are up. Pesto basil is still not. I have forgotten to proof any Rainbow chard but will do so today.

I have four dozen springerle molded and ready to go into the oven but will post no pictures as they would add no new information to my LJ. I took a step backwards and did the 100% canonical flavoring -- the zest of one lemon and a cookie sheet sprinkled with anise seed. The oven is warming and I'll be popping them in directly.

Today is Roy's birthday, but he had to go out of town, not to come back till tomorrow. We've agreed that the date for Roy's Birthday Observed will be Saturday, and I am looking for a restaurant that is 1) not the Union League; 2) a maker of fearsome Manhattans; 3) good with seafood; 4) not a place we've gone to repeatedly.

One flower on the second scape of 'gervase' is collapsing. (It's the one I pollinated...) The pollinated ovary on the first scape continues to swell. Its stem is green and fat -- the stems of the other three are shriveling and turning brown. I begin to believe we have achieved pollination, but I've seen false pregnancies on Hippeastrum before.

The parsley seedlings looked light-starved, so I took them out back.

Most of the marjoram has bounced back from its transplanting.

And also -- last night sitting at the computer I found myself feeling most uncomfy. So I looked at the thermometer. It was 78F. And the room was muggy because it's full of plants. Eeeuw. I am *so* not ready to put on the air conditioning.

Two blooms of the second 'Exotica' scape have opened and mine eyes do spy a *third* stalk coming up -- it's about three inches tall now. Because the stalks are coming up in sequence like this I won't get the all-at-once showy display, but that's okay -- I'll get a mid- or late-April bonus.

The girly bits of the one 'gervase' I pollinated with 'apple blossom' pollen have completely shriveled and died, but I think I detect a swelling in the ovary. All four blossoms on the second scape are open. There's no sudden collapse of the blossom I tried to pollinate with superannuated 'apple blossom' pollen, but it's early days yet. Downstairs, the Class of 2006 has two representatives blooming or about to. Neither is particularly exciting, but they *are* my firstborn, so I'll probably keep them.

The Class of 2009, recently transplanted, has a bit of a case of yellowing leaves. They don't especially like being transplanted when they're not dormant, so it's probably just a shocky reaction while their roots re-establish. Another few weeks and they go outdoors to soak up the sunshine.

Nopalxochia is putting on quite a show in one corner but will be winding down this week, I think, except for two or three outliers.

Thyme is germinating beyond my wildest dreams -- I can't count the number of pinhead seedlings, but it's a heap more than I need. I see the first parsleys today, too -- four or five of them. The surface-sown seeds of the impatiens are plumping up and showing tiny white swellings at the corners, so I expect to have an abundance of them as well. All in all, I will probably have more plants than back yard.

In non-gardening news, Roy and I went to see Alice in Wonderland on the big screen. We both found the high level of the audio intensely painful. I had earplugs in my bag, but only one set; Roy fabricated some out of toilet paper. Thus insulated somewhat from the assault on our eardrums, we liked the film very much. Roy commented on our ride home that he thinks we would have missed a lot of the effect if we'd waited for the DVD.

I spent eight hours on the Show Floor yesterday in a split shift and I am taking the day (mostly) off from the show to recover. Also, it's about time I paid a little more attention to my Day Job.

I didn't see clindau's message in time to send greetings to my sister, but will do so at my next opportunity.

In other news, I have discovered that my desktop machine positively refuses to acknowledge the existence of the SD-MMC card. However, the ASUS happily reads it. Thus, I can do a clunky workaround -- SD-MMC card in the slot, external hard drive in the USB port, and transfer. I hope. I shot a video last night, with no clue what I was doing, and we'll see how that went.

I have good germination on my marjoram, thirteen buds on the Nopalxochia, and a second flower stalk emerging from the Hippeastrum 'exotica.'

EDIT: And I spy a second bud amid the leaves on the 'gervase." Whee!

My final tour day has been changed from Thursday to Friday. This will make the time with the artistic and horticultural classes much more interesting -- there will be judging going on in both areas. It also means, I think, that my new day off, Thursday, will be a day on which absolutely nothing is going on in those areas so I'll have a free hand to photograph to my heart's content, but no free coffee.

In other news, I uploaded my niece's photos to one of my servers so that she can grab them if she wants them before I mail the CD to her. Also...the *picture* quality on the video I shot is fabulous. The technical/artistic quality, not so much.