The flatness or roundness is hereditary and due to the parents of the hybrid. Judges look for flatness in the flower but I have little interest in what the judges say. If its a nice flower and you enjoy it that's all that matters. Enjoy your flowers - presumably that's why you have them and each and every one has its own special qualities.

Agree. It isn't a question of picking too soon but maybe using too soon. Any tomato including Roma can be picked anytime after it blushes and it will finish ripening inside. Many of us do this routinely - pick at blush - and it is discussed in great detail on the Tomatoes forum. It eliminates the cracking, bug damage, and disease exposure problems. But then you do have to let them ripen fully inside before using them. But I find that Romas tend to be difficult to peel anyway and they do remain firm - not to mention their lack of flavor. That's one reason why I much prefer other paste varieties. Dave

i kind of wonder wgat would happen if you got theis certain spike to produce a keiki... on rare occasion a plant will have 1 part of the plant that will have a genetic nutation thats not present in the rest of the plant (which is how the washington oranage came to be)maybe this is the case with your phal. i wonder if you were to make it produce a keiki, would the flowers off of the F2 plant stay somewhat closed as this spike is doing now....

Thanks, all. The market here is quite hot, though I suppose it could cool in the next year. I doubt it, though-- it seems like more people want to live closer in and have shorter commutes and we are within a couple of miles of a new high-tech employment area, near the university, and not far from downtown. I talked to a neighbor recently with a very similar house. She has a realtor (lets call her Realtor #1) she's worked with for decades who only works in this area. Realtor #1 gave her very specific recommendations for what to do in advance (she plans to sell in August), and told her that her house would probably sell in 3 days. So I'm thinking we won't list until we are truly ready to go, which depends mostly on precisely when we decide to retire. I think we will probably wait a month or two and get some "known" issues taken care of, then set up something will Realtor #1. Then I suppose to be responsible, we'll have to find Realtors #2 and #3 as well. Although to be honest, I wouldn't mind skipping that... I guess I understand the criteria for selecting someone with a good track record of short times on market, etc. But when inventory is low and demand is high, what do you look for in an agent? Is it different?