My doc thinks I'm on the verge of being a diabetic.  She told me that back in July.  "If we don't get your blood sugar under control, we'll have to put you on medication."  Well, I'm not going to let THAT happen if I can help it!!  So I've been studying and reading and changing my diet...  Watching my carbs, but more than that, I've learned that the CAUSE of diabetes in inflammation, and the CAUSE of inflammation is our horrible American diet.  It's all the processed foods we eat.  So I've been working on getting back to basics.  I'm eating a LOT more vegetables, more fruit (though not tons because fruit has a lot of carbs...), a lot more fiber, and adding things like green tea, vinegar and honey and knox geletin to my diet every day.  The green tea is a great anti-oxident and I've read that people who drink at least 4 cups of green tea a deay drastically reduce their risk of diabetes (and a lot of other things, too!)  I've known forever that honey and vinegar are really good for you, but apparently they're a big gun in the fight with arthritis, which I'm sure I have plenty of in my joints.  And so is the knox - that's something that Dr. Joel Wallach has been prescribing to people for years, and I used it myself for a period several years ago, but back then, my arthritis wasn't bad enough (or in enough of my joints) to keep me interested in doing it.  NOW I've got more motivation!

And I'm happy to report it all seems to be helping quite a lot!  I don't know about my blood sugar specifically, because I don't have the means to test it, but here's what I can report...  I feel better, much better.  My joint pain is often non-existent, and when I do have it, so far it seems less severe.  (Mind you, I rarely have what I'd call HORRIBLE joint pain, but it gets me up at night sometimes, and it can impede my work at times, too...)  I'm pretty sure I've lost some weight.  I don't do the scale-thing - it just depresses me.  But I can feel changes happening.  Maybe it's just a shift right now, but my clothes are fitting differently and I don't have that big-as-a-house feel, that bloated-to-the-point-of-floating-away feel.  I can't see a difference in the mirror, so I'm not jumping for joy, but I guess it should be more about how I feel than how I look.

Anyway, I haven't been doing it long enough to throw a parade yet... maybe a month or 6 weeks.  But I figure if the way I feel can turn around this fast, imagine how I might feel in a year?  I'm pretty pumped about it right now.  Of course, the hard part is Mark and the whole fixing two meals every night.  It sucks beyond sucking.  He would never, EVER consider eating any of "that crap" - you know, healthy stuff.  Vegetables - oh shudder!  Skinless chicken breast - YUCK!  Fish - OMG, he would surely die!!  (Unless, of course, it was either Joe Tess's fish or Long John Silvers - you know, fried and greasy...)  Which is how I got this way.  Back when I met Mark 26 years ago and started cooking for him, I would fix veggies and he wouldn't eat them.  And there came a point when I thought it's too much work to fix them JUST for me.  So I pretty much quit and only fixed them when I got a real craving...Dummy.  I'd advise any young lady taking on such a man (hopefully these cave men are going extinct...) to either run for the hills or at the very least, don't change your good diet to his bad diet.  If you don't believe me, let me send a photo of me when I met him and one of me now!  That'll cure ya!  LOL!  I know, I know - I can't blame it all on him.  It's always been ME putting that stuff in my mouth.  And it's ME that decided I'd rather make him happy with what he wants to eat rather than fixing what's good for us and let the chips fall where they may.  His health has suffered some because of it, too, but that doesn't make him want to change.  Let's just say he's none to happy with the way I've been cooking lately...

Anyway, enough about that stuff.  On to plant stuff...

About a few new ones - not necessarily THIS year new, but let's say in the last year or so new.  Once again, I got a few cuttings of Hoya linearis...

(Don't ask me why I can't get photos to stay the way I turn them when I post them here - damn it!)  Linearis has always been a troublesome one for me.  It's so delicate, so un-Hoya-like, and it seems to either lose it's roots and the stem dries and dies, or it rots.  Well, I got these cuttings this year, some from Jessica and a few from another GW trader, and so far, they're doing just fine.  And they've grown (yay!)  So this morning, I chopped off a couple of the longest lengths and put them back in the pot.  I'm hopeful they'll root in, but even if they don't, it will encourage some branching.  It seems to like it's spot on an east windowsill in the sunroom...

Ditto Hoya retusa - another problematic Hoya for me...

Also very un-Hoya-like, but the leaves are much stiffer, less delicate.  I like it a lot and hope it'll grow for me.  Again, I got some of it from Jessica and some from the same GW trade I got the linearis from.  It seems to be holding its own, though I don't think it's grown much if at all. Maybe I'll put it next to linearis in the sunroom...

This one I got last summer from Regina from Cubits.  It's H. blashernaezii...

I've got it in one of my smaller heavy B.J. pots and it dries out really fast.  I keep it on the shelf in the sunroom and it hadn't grown much at all for me, but always looked healthy.  But now, it's putting on the tiniest new leaves - you can see one if you look really close, down by some of the older leaves.  I really like the long leaves and the almost white veins.  I think it could be a pretty one!

H. ??...

I can't quite figure out what this one is.  I lost the tag and I've been guessing ever since.  I think it might be one I got from Dee, but I'm not sure.  I'm going to e-mail her and see if she knows what it is...  It's looking quite happy, so I need to figure it out!

And lastly (for today), I got a Sansevieria at the RCCSS auction.  It's S. pulchra coppertone...

A small offset, but very pretty!  I'm keeping it in an east window in the sunroom and so far, it seems to like getting a few hours of sun.  It could turn into a real beauty!

'Nuff for today.  Got to get ready to go to the dentist...

It's been awhile since I've rambled on about my Hoyas, so today I'd like to start a ramble about what new ones I aquired this summer.  These first two I got from Jessica (aka GreedyGhost  on GW).  They had a good start to rooting when I got them, and they were both small cuttings of very small Hoyas, so I've got them in the same pot.  They're also very, VERY similar, and I'm not sure I'd know which is which if the tags go missing!  This first one is H. dickensoniana...

It has grow pretty significantly from the tip and just keeps getting longer and longer, and though I've been tempted to lop it off and root some back into the pot, I decided to wait until next spring to do that.  But what I did do was pinch the growing tip.  I'm excited to report that it worked like a charm!  There is a teeny-tiny new vine starting at the base!!  Yay!  It hardly every works that well!  Usually, you'll get a new growth point somewhere along the vine, sometimes way too close to the growing tip. 

Now see if you can tell the difference in the two - here is the other one, H. engleriana...

Both of these are said to be similar to bella and I would have to agree, though the leaves are much, much smaller.  This engleriana sounds like it may be a difficult species to grow - that it's fussy about running too dry.  It says it tends to drop leaves when unhappy, and I notice a brand new vine that has shot out rather quickly does have some yellow leaves on it.  I'll have to watch it closely to make sure it doesn't over-dry.

H. sipitangensis is another one I got from Jessica...

This is a nice little species, too.  More succulent with very nice, shiny, dark green leaves.  It has started new growth twice, but it keep aborting the new leaves.  I'm not sure what that's about - I can't find a whole lot of info about this species.

H. cv. 'Rebecca' is one of the few that survived from my Epiphytica order...

It was in questionable shape when I got it, so I took cuttings and started them.  The mother plant bounced back after a few weeks, so I put them all together.  It had some pretty coloring when I got it, so I'm hoping that next summer, I can give it enough sun that it will get those "sun-kissed" red tones again...  It really brings out the veining.

Another one from Jessica is buottii.  I know I got this species from Dee at one time, but lost it.  I'm happy to say it's well rooted and actually putting on new growth...

Can you see the little new vine poking out from the leaf node?  Yay!  I'm going to try to keep this pinched back.  I've read it's a lot like 'Iris Marie', which grows pretty wild.  In fact, I plan to whack up my 'IM' this winter and root up a bunch of cuttings.  My hope is that the mother plant will restart from the woody stems and I'll try to keep it more compact, or I'll keep some cuttings to start a new one all together.

Most of my Ted Green cuttings have rooted.  There are two left in the rooting dome, only because he cuts them in a way that makes them REALLY hard to root.  I this Ted's a great guy, but his cuttings are small, healthy as all get out, but SMALL!  And often, he cuts them so there's hardly any stem at all, and I hate to lop off two of the leaves when there are often not more than four all together!  So here are the rooted ones... 

First is loyceandresiana.  This particular one had only the one leaf.  A large leaf, mind you, a healthy leaf, but just the one.  Thankfully, there was a nice stem to root it...

This makes me think of latifolia.  It's going to be one of my favs!

Then we have fitchii...

This was a really stingy cutting.  Only the two leaves and a bit of stem.  But it rooted fast and if I can get it through the winter, I'm sure it'll be fine.  I wish he'd just say, "My mother plant is rather small right now so I can't offer a very generous cutting," and I would have probably picked something else.  I guess maybe I shouldn't wait until so late in the season to order from him...

H. paulshirleyii was more generous, but one of those with a difficult stem to root...

This one is a fairly fleshy one, so I think I'm really going to like it. 

H. platycaulis is an interesting one...

...and it's actually got new growth on it, too!  A thin-leaved species, it reminds me a bit of lobbii, on a smaller scale.

And the last one that has rooted is danumensis...

I bought this one for the flowers - photos show they're whie and cup-shaped, very pretty.  I can't wait for it to grow up and bloom!  It's thinner leaved than I had anticipaed, but I do like it.  
I have the two others that are still rooting, both have little tiny roots starting (finally!) so I'll consider them out of the woods soon and post photos. 

Now, about the Dischidias I got from Tom at UNO.  Since I really don't know the species, I'm just going to show photos...

Below are two different shingle-type Dischidias.  The one on the bottom is the one I've been able to grow (not particularly well) in with some other plants.  That one, I put in a flat with orchid bark and am keeping it fairly moist to see if I can get it to form a kind of "carpet" on the bark.  The bigger one, I put on a nice chunk of cork bark I bought (cost me over 30 bucks with shipping!!)  I have a feeling it's going to be hard to keep it moist enough like that, but we'll see.  My plan is to soak it at least once a week and to try to remember to spray it every day.  I'll put photos up later of them as mounted...

This one makes me think of my fasciated acuminata, but there's no fasciation, so I'm wondering if it could be plain acuminata.  I haven't done much research on it yet...

I think this flower was on ramosii, which I do grow but hasn't bloomed for me yet.  It took me about 20 photos to get one clear enough to see.  They're so tiny, you could blink and miss them!

Everything else is stuff I've already got, I'm pretty sure.  As they take and start to grow, I'll be posting more photos...

My mom spent 12 days with my brother.  Wes has mesothelia  to - the cancer associated with asbestos.  He was diagnosed 15 years ago.  If you know anything about mesothelioma, that sounds crazy.  Back when he was diagnosed, I did some research and if I believed what I read about it, I would be losing my brother within a couple of years if it ran its typcial course.  I was beside myself, but kept my feelings to myself.  Wanted to be supportive of Wes, but also didn't want to alarm my mom.  Not that she was naive.  But she was (as I'm sure most parents are) in denial.  But time passed...it was a RARE case of this cancer being dormant.

Well, apparently they think it "switched on" very recently, and it's growing.  So he's going through chemo.  Sally, his wife, has had her own health issues.  A viral infection in her heart this summer, from which she's recovering.  Her family goes to Florida each fall, so Mom went out to stay with Wes so Sally could go with her family. 

So it seems Wes's chemo is going well.  The first one was a little rough.  Ok, not a little rough.  A LOT rough.  He had to go to the emergency room on the 3rd day after because he was vomiting and needed fluids.  The second round (they were doing them every 3 weeks) was a little better, but still a little rough.  He had his 3rd while Mom was there and it went well...  Maybe the "mommy effect"???  Whatever it is, YOU GO WES!!!  He's my hero for going through all he has in his life and still coming out with his very good attitude!

Anyway, I'm sure happy to have Mom back in town.  I just wish Wes could be closer...  But Sally's family is out there.  I understand her need to be close to her family, and Wes's wish to make Sally happy.  It's all good.  Maybe we can't be together all the time now, but we will be someday....in some realm...