New stuff...

It's been awhile since I posted. Coronavirus rages on here, more so in the midwest than in the rest of the country. But in my opinion, I'm not sure if it's warranted the extreme measures taken as a country. People have died, yes, but people have died from many many other things as well. I think that anybody who has a serious health condition certainly should take extra precautions, but it seems ridiculous to see people walking around wearing masks, reporters wearing masks on TV. As of yesterday at 5:45 p.m., the coronavirus website for Nebraska shows 14,101 cases of coronavirus in Nebraska, and there have been 170 deaths. Douglas County now leads the numbers by far at 4198 cases, and Hall County, who used to be the leader, now has 1503. Cass now sits at 50.

The real reason I decided to blog today... Well, there's actually a few. First of all, we're supposed to hit 90 degrees today so I figured there will come a point where I'm not going to want to do much outside. But I wanted to get something off my chest even before that... This whole thing about the guy in Minneapolis who was killed by police, and all the stuff that's been happening because of that...  Because in time I probably won't remember the details, the basic synopsis is that this guy, George Floyd, was stopped by police and I'm guessing that the police are saying that he resisted arrest. They ended up with him on the ground and one of the officers put his knee on the guys upper back, neck area I guess, and held him down and he eventually passed out because he couldn't breathe. He died on the way to the hospital I guess. There were four officers together, the other three did nothing even though the guy kept saying I can't breathe, I can't breathe. And a young girl, 17 years old, recorded most of it with her cell phone. And ever since, there have been riots everywhere. There were two nights of riots and destruction in Omaha, and then as of yesterday, the mayor decided to enact a curfew for the next three days of 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. There was still shit going on last night in spite of the curfew, but I guess that gives the cops the authority to arrest people for just being out, which is fine with me when they're up to no good.

But the things that I wanted to say about this is it every time something like this happens, I always wonder what led up to this? There's always someone who turns on their phone after things go bad, but doesn't anyone else wonder why did this happen in the first place? And it's always so hard to find those details! I didn't even hear whether he was stopped on foot or in a car! I found one teeny tiny quip that said that the reason this guy was pursued by police is because a shopkeeper called the cops because he allegedly tried to pass a $20 bill. Now, if I turned over a $20 bill to a shopkeeper and it turned out to be counterfeit, I'd like to think that the shopkeeper would assume that I had been passed the fake bill unbeknownst to me, and that this was an honest mistake. I would like to think he would just hand it back to me and say, sorry this is a fake, try again! Well, no actually he would probably keep it... I suppose that the bank tells businesses that they should confiscate counterfeit bills, though once being a business owner I'm not sure I would have thought of that. Hell, I never even bothered to use one of those silly pens to check the money that I got! Anyway, that's neither here nor there. Why hasn't someone gone to that shop and asked for video footage from there? Interviewed the shopkeeper? Did he try to keep the bill and this guy freaked out? Did he call the cops because he thought the guy was trying to do it on purpose? I'd kind of like to know how the whole thing got started. Now I know that knowing that doesn't change the outcome, but maybe if we can find out the details leading up, maybe we can see how the over-reaction started. Not to excuse it mind you, but I think seeing other details might spread the blame out a bit more. Maybe the shopkeeper overreacted... Maybe George Floyd overreacted as well... I guess what I'm trying to say is I just don't understand why the media, who used to be all about investigating every detail, isn't trying to find out more of the "before" part of the equation. I guess I'm just going to have to wait until there's a Dateline story about it to find out all the details.

On a lighter note, I also wanted to talk about the plants I've been selling on Facebook Hoya Lovers store.  Wow I just can't believe what people are willing to pay for small starter plants! Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining! But I remember when I found my Hoya macrophylla... I'm going to estimate it was probably around 2002 or 2003. It was at one of our Cactus Club show and sales, and it was $17. It was a nice rooted cutting mind you, but $17 was more than I had ever paid for a single plant and I was hesitant. I remember walking around looking at other plants, wanting it so bad, but debating whether I could really justify spending that much money on one plant. In the end, I did and OMG I'm so glad I did! But the point of this story is to illustrate how much things have changed in less than 20 years. People obviously have a lot more disposable income than I ever did!

Anyway, what I sold so far... I'm on my 3rd coriacea, I sold a couple of lobbiis, a meliflua, and a Dischidia nr. Burma... I've made right at $500 all six plants plus some cuttings. I've been selling them auction Style... The first time, I gave it 2 days, but after that it's always been about a day and a half. I usually list them in the morning and make the cutoff time 6 p.m. the next day. By the time 36 hours have passed, they're usually so far down that nobody is seeing them anyway. I've got two on there right now that will end at 6:00 tonight... last time I checked, the coriacea was up to $50 and the other one, which is just a shepherdell growing in hydroton, was up to $37. 

Time for some photos! I moved my Hoya macrophylla from the north side of my sunroom to the south side. I'm tired of it hardly growing at all. In fact, a month or so ago I put the heating pad under it trying to get it to grow. Nothing... Or at least that's what I thought! When I moved it to the other side of the room, I found an itty bitty leaf starting about halfway up the main vine. Oh I was so excited! I've been taking pictures of it every couple of days to document how fast it's growing. Here are the photos so far...

Unfortunately, it faces the window and it's going to be hard to get a good picture of the front of it now. Next time I take a picture, I may take the whole vine down to get a picture of the front and put it back up. I sure hope it takes off and produces of vine with more leaves.

Today, I got two Dischidias from Marco. Last week, he went to his local market and found that they had a whole plethora of Hoyas and Dischidias and even several Rhipalis.  I told him it was a good thing I wasn't down there - I'd be spending a whole lot of money! Not that I would know what the heck I would do with a whole bunch more plants! But oh they had so many nice ones! Well, he was kind enough to buy two of the Dischidias (that I had grown at one time and lost) for me and send them to me. They arrived today in awesome condition and I got them potted into my mix and they're happily in their new spots. First we have Dischidia oiantha variegata...

The leaves are a lot smaller then the one that I used to grow, but that could simply be that they get so much more sun in Florida. We'll see as it grows out... The other one is 'Geri'...

And he was also generous enough to send me another cutting of ilagiorum... he sent a cutting of this to me earlier this spring, and it rooted nicely in the sunroom and actually has a baby leaf on it, which I will also show. This one was a big enough cutting that I cut it in three spots and potted it up to root. Once it's rooted, I'll put them all together in a four and a half inch pot and it will look like a lovely full plant!