Life is better...

 I did end up talking to Matt, my money guy, and he assured me things were ok in the money department, so I looked at the last two months of statements and overall, it was a little up.  A couple of bad months made me afraid to look.  And since then, it's been up a little more.  I'm feeling some relief, but I'm not giving any credit to Trump.  In fact, I would say it's up in spite of Trump and all the crazy shit he's doing.  

So money is ok.  And, PRAISE THE LORD, my neighbors moved last week!  You can't imagine how much relief that alone brings me!  They perpetuated a lot of angst in me.  I've been home (not working) the last 3 weeks because of excessive sleepiness.  When I was driving one day, I couldn't hardly keep my eyes open and actually opened my eyes one with the realization I had dozed of for a second.  That scared me!  So... time to figure out what's going on.  I went to the doc and she tested my thyroid.  That's ok.  And next Monday, I do a sleep study.  I don't think that's going to tell them anything - I sleep just fine.  I'm thinking maybe it's a virus, or maybe I had another bout of covid and didn't know it (I didn't the first two times), but maybe I was left with the extreme tiredness that so many people experience for a while, even months and months, afterward.  I think it's a little better, but I'm still finding it awfully easy to doze off if I'm just sitting.

A crazy few days... I've had the opportunity to use my generator THREE times in the last 36 hours or so!  Night before last, there was a windy rain that blew through and just as I was coming upstairs at 10:30, a transformer exploded about 50 feet from my house and off went the lights.  Of course, the generator kicked in after about 10 seconds.  It came back on about 5 hours later.  Then last night at about 8:30, I was downstairs watching TV, no wind, nothing and the lights blinked off.  On came the generator, and a little more than 2 hours later, just before I went back up to go to bed, it came back on.  Then last night, I woke up to rain hitting the west windows in my bedroom and a few minutes later, ka-blewy, transformer blew again!  It was off a couple hours again.  So a total of 9 hours in about 36 hours.  I'm feeling more and more like this was a good investment!

My Hoya kanyakumariana is blooming!  Last year was the very first time and I think it was just the one umbel I got.  Well, this year, I see all kinds of teeny-tiny peduncles!  The flowers are like a tiny version of carnosa flowers.  The whole umbel is about the size of a quarter:

Marco, my bud in Florida, nicknamed this one the "corn flake" Hoya for its wavy edges.  It's a perfectly descriptive name and a lot easier to say than its botanical name!  

This one is Hoya sp. aff. vitellina.  This is such an old plant and so rootbound, I really do need to just reboot it.  I'm going to take some cuttings and do that before fall.  I'm just waiting for some stuff to finish rooting in my two tubs.  Anyway, the flowers are really such an amazing butterscotch color, but unfortunately, they don't look nice and compact like many Hoya flowers:

And a most interesting phenomenon that happens now and then, more often with a few species like kerrii, is buds maturing as new young buds form behind  the soon-to-open buds:

This is Hoya parviflora.  This delicate little Hoya has long slender leaves that are slightly succulent and make a perfect hanging plant.  It did ok for me, but never really grew much and certainly never bloomed for some years.  A lovely lady from my cactus club passed away - she and her husband, Claude, were very active in the club and Claude was kind enough to give me some nice seashells they had collected over the years when he heard I enjoy growing small plants in shells.  I put parviflora in the shell I liked the best and (yes, literally) asked Carol Ann to watch over this little gem.  And boy, did it take off and thrive!  It started growing and looked absolutely perky!  Call it coincidence if you want, but I truly believe Carol Ann is bringing me this bit of joy through this plant!  Anyway, for the very first time in the 13 years I've had this, it was budding up!...

And the flower itself did not disappoint - it's every bit as special as the plant itself:

Tiny furry discs with a blush corolla and mauve edged corona.  And as near as I can tell, there are 32 individual flowers in the super-tiny umbel!  

Here is Hoya juannguoiana, a big-leaved Hoya that is quite a site to behold. The leaves start out rubbery and mature into super-succulent.  The markings are subtle, the consistency gives it real eye-appeal...

It has been pretty good about blooming:

They're very pretty flowers that remind me of the very stingy macrophylla - a skosh darker, but that same gradient look.  But once they reflex back, they aren't nearly as pretty:

I rebooted my old (VERY old!) H. pubicalyx 'Pink Silver' this spring.  Oh, how I hated throwing away that huge old plant, but it was looking tired and stressed, so it was time.  I took a bunch of cuttings and rooted them in some perlite (fast rooting, strong/healthy roots!) and plopped them in a good-sized EA pot.  And at last, they are starting to grow!  I found at least seven new growth points with tiny leaves starting!...

But uh-oh, aphids!  I have fought those little motherf*ckers all winter long, in my kitchen on a nice Dischidia ovata I have growing in the window.  Teeny-tiny ones.  I've been hitting every plant I find them on with a dose of tree and shrub that I usually use for mealybugs.  I hope it poisons it for these little assholes too!  They are a nuisance!  They go for the new growth and supposedly you can just hit them with a spray of water.  But I did this before I took the photo and there are still some of those little f*ckers still hanging on!  So I hit it with a spray of alcohol and added some of the T&S to the soil.  

Well, the sky is getting a little dark so I better batten the hatches before the next storm rolls in.  I didn't think we were supposed to get anything until tonight after dark, maybe even into the middle of the night.  But this time of year, when the atmosphere is unstable, a storm can pop up anytime.  So enough for today!