It's been all over the news for nearly 2 weeks...  A little girl, 4-years-old, was found in her "caretaker's" home, dead, wrapped in plastic, under the basement stairs, with lumber piled on her.  Seems the "caretaker's" family got concerned about the little girl (why not the little girl's family???) and went over to the house at 10:00 one night to find the house without heat, no food in the house except 2 packages of ramen noodles, no refrigerator, no furnishings except a couch and a "thin mattress on the floor."  This woman (or so-called "caretaker") was being paid $1600/month to be this little girl's "caretaker."  (I read that on KETV's site under the comments, so I can't say that this is 100% true...)

Everything about this story infuriates me.  The mother has been all over the news, acting all indignant and outraged about this, but where has she been?  In every single news story I've seen her in, she's toting around a little boy.  Ok... she has another kid (maybe more??) and she passes off the older one to some stupid little bitch who obviously isn't taking care of her?  Oh, but how would SHE know that?  She obviously has never gone to the home of this woman, because believe me, it didn't become what they discovered overnight...WTF??

I'd sure like to hear something about this story that makes sense.  They're only charging the "caretaker" with felony child abuse and she'll get (maybe) 3 years. How can that be?  The autopsy was apparently inconclusive.  The story they got was that on Sunday, she found the girl having difficulty breathing.  Well, instead of taking her to the ER, they "prayed" for her.  Okayyyy... She died.  Instead of calling the authorities, they wrapped her in plastic and put her in the basement.  Okayyyyy...  And then the suspicious family discovers her 2 days later.  Does this makes sense to ANYONE??  It is beyond ugly from every perspective.  And the girl's mother has made such a spectacle of herself.  Instead of getting in front of the camera and admitting that she wasn't there for her child, showing some remorse for her role in what happened... maybe even shed a tear or two... she just walks around shouting and over-acting, seemingly oblivious to how disgusting she comes off.  UGH!!!

I started this back when this was in the news and never finished it.  About the only thing I've learned is that she "faces up to 3 years in jail" over this.  I think the mother should be right there beside her.  It's awful.  Ok, 'nuff said!

Two two-ty two...

...In other words, the 22nd of February!  I've always said that twenty would more logically be pronounced "two-ty".  Think about it - "forty" sounds like "four" with "ty" on the end. Sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety also all make sense.  "Thirty" should be "three-ty", "fifty" should be "five-ty" (ok, that one sounds a little awkward...)  And the teens would be a little weird, I guess... Onety-one, onety-two, onety-three...and so on.  Ok, I know, my brain is a little weird!!  

So I've been watering and grooming, assessing what has maintained over the winter, what has suffered, what is already growing.  I'm overall very pleased with what I'm seeing.  Oh, a few I'm very sad about, but I haven't given up hope on anything yet.  

All my long-leaved varieties are looking OUTSTANDING!  I took some photos... My two wayettis... this is the one growing above the sink in hydroton:
 
This one cascades so beautifully... It's outer pot is a pretty oriental pot and I have it on a tall candle stand and it's like a waterfall of leaves down one side.  Then I have another that hangs in the west kitchen window.  That's my original EA plant from 2003 (all others have been cuttings off of that one) and it has really taken to that window.  I took it down to water and the side facing the window was just stunning...

And look at the new growth!...

I am such a fan of these long leaved Hoyas!  So I took down shepherdell and gave it a good watering and examination and, viola, lots of new growth on that one, too!  Shepherdell is a cross between carnosa x shepherdii... I got my shepherdell in 2007 - I got a cutting in a trade, and I liked it so much, I ordered a plant from CBFM.

And then we have 'Minibelle' - I got mine as a cutting from Yale in Illinois back in 2006.  It's leaves are SO similar to shepherdell I have to keep the tags in them to know which is which.  The one difference is that 'Minibelle's' leaves tend to be a bit inconsistent, and what I mean by that is that they sometimes have a little bump out on a leaf.  'Minibelle' is a cross between shepherdii x carnosa... This probably explains whey 'Minibelle' and shepherdell are so similar.  I assume the difference in the way the cross is written is due to the pod parent - I think the pod parent is the one named first.

 Then we also have the old shepherdii, or the String Bean Hoya, which was in one of my very earliest trades (before I was diligent about keeping my database), so I'm guessing it's 15+ years old.  

I have a few others whose leaves aren't nearly so long, but I still find them so appealing, like siamica, which is still small...

 

Longifolia is another one.  I thought I'd lost it and took it off my list, but it came back and now I don't know where it came from!  So now, when I THINK one is a goner, I put it on a list called "lost?" and I can move it back to the main list if it comes back.  Here's longifolia...

 

The flowers are different than the others, all of which are fairly similar to carnosa...

I adore yellow flowers!  Yellow flowers is probably the only reason I even keep vanuatuensis, which is rather ho-hum foliage-wise...

Oh, and then last long-leaved one I'll mention is the true tsangii, which is very dainty, delicate and sweet...

So that's my ramble for today!



 

Well, several Hoyas are already responding to the longer days with new growth, inlcluding...

H. mindorensis has a nice little new vine with baby leaves.  It's in the sunroom in front of the east windows.

H. crassicaulis - I have two of them, one in my bedroom and one in the sunroom, again in front of the east window.  It has at least two new growth points, one is right down by the soil line!

H. wayetti is above my sink in the kitchen, in the north window.  I see an itty-bitty new leaf popping!  This is the one I'm growing in hydroton.

H. coreacia is in the greenhouse.  This is one of the thin-leaved species and I had a hard time getting it going.  Either last year or the year before, it took off like a bat out of hell and has done beauifully ever since.  I found several new growth points on it.  YAY!

H. parviflora, one of the slowest growers I've EVER had, has what appears to be a new leaf.  It has that rubbery feel and it's darker than the others - I can't be 100% positive, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this may be the year it gets a real growth spurt!

More on that next time...  I also went through my trays of rooted "for sale" plants, picked out those that had died, cleaned up the ones that were fine, and made a list of what I'll offer soon to clear out and make room for new plants to root.  This is what I came up with...

Hoya australis ssp. tenuipes                                                                               

Hoya australis ssp. tenuipes

Hoya callistrophylla

Hoya carnosa (give away plant with order of $25 or more)

Hoya carnosa ssp. carnosa

Hoya carnosa ssp. carnosa

Hoya inconspicua

Hoya cv. ‘Jennifer’

Hoya macgillivrayii (give away)

Hoya macgillivrayii (give away)

Hoya macgillivrayii

Hoya macgillivrayii

Hoya macgillivrayii

Hoya macrophylla

             

Hoya macrophylla variegata

Hoya cv. ‘Mathilde’ (small start)                                                                               

Hoya micrantha                            

Hoya micrantha                             

Hoya sp. Nong Nooch

Hoya obovata

Hoya obovata

Hoya obovata

Hoya obovata

Hoya obovata

Hoya obovata x carnosa

Hoya obscura

Hoya pubicalyx ‘Royal Hawaiian Purple’

Hoya rigida

Hoya verticillata

Hoya verticillata

Hoya verticillata

Hoya villosa

Hoya sp. aff. vitellina

Dischidia acuminata, fasciated form                      

Dischidia acuminata, fasciated form                    

Dischidia acuminata, fasciated form                    

Dischidia acuminata, fasciated form

Dischidia acuminata, fasciated form 

I listed them all separately like this so I can put prices on them.  The Dischidias are all small starts, and if I put them together in one pot, I'd probably ask $15, so I'm going to ask $3 apiece for those.  I have a few give-aways, which I'll give with orders.