Gosh Lilo, I can't imagine the underlying stress of living in 'quake country. I've watched lots of those science shows on earthquakes and I guess there are distinctions between quakes - like Linda denotes - rollers and shakers. We had a quake here in Illinois back in the '70's. I was living out in a cabin in the woods, far from any major roads. The stovepipe rattled as if there was a big truck traveling nearby. It was so unusual I thought immediately, "Earthquake", but then dismissed it because how silly would that be - an earthquake in Illinois? It was in fact a quake, and then I learned that one of the most powerful quakes ever in history occurred not far from here in New Madrid, Missouri. It changed the course of the Mississippi River and rang church bells in Boston!! But quakes around here, although possibly extremely deadly are also extremely rare. I'll take my chances with tornados here in the midwest. Not quite sure if I could sleep at night in quake country. Do those who live there always have that little nagging fear in the back of your mind? I do know that someone I work with was raised in California, and after the Katrina disaster she did state that growing up in Calif. you were instilled with the idea that in case of a disaster you were responsible for your own survival for at least three days. That was her reality. Also can't imagine having to constantly get out of town when a hurricane approaches. My dad grew up in the Florida, and in those days and his area getting out was not an option. They sat out many 'canes in a home that was what could be described as a shack. Perhaps it weathered the winds because the boards were loosely spaced and the wind partially went through the building instead of mowing it down as wind pressure hits a solid structure. Lots of stuff to think about Lilo. What Mt. St. Helens doing lately, does anyone know? I know the new dome is growing at a rate of 6 ft per day.

As long as this is on the ear & problems, may I ask this seemingly crazy question?: I can make my ears "click'! At first I would just notice it when I swallowed but then realized I can do it at will .... the 'clicking' but doctors just looked at me like I was kidding! My sister has it also & says her son can actually hear it when she does it! Now is this crazy or what or can others do it.. & is is heriditary? I was told people are told to try & do this in airplanes to eqalize the pressure but a lot of persons find it difficult to do ... surely not ME!! Sorta like 'cracking one's knuckles' out of boredom?! Sorry for this distraction! My sister-in-law has the ear problem of this type of vertigo for years & also was shown how to lay down in the proper position & do the things mentioned by others. It helped for a while but soon the vertigo took over her life & she was an invalid from it! Had a surgery to severe a nerve in that ear but was warned she might lose her hearing in that ear permanently ... and she did! She says losing the hearing was less worse than the awful vertigo/vomiting/falling she experienced before!

How long does it take for a FLF or a plant in general to bounce back? It depends on what's wrong, where the plant is located, current cultural conditions, and how close the plant was to dying. Plants decline when something cultural is forcing to operate at or beyond the cultural conditions they are genetically programmed to tolerate. When plants aren't in their cultural 'sweet spot', it causes stress. Operating at or beyond what they're programmed can cause consumption of more energy than the plant produces. This is something beyond stress, called strain. Strain, uncorrected, always leads to death unless corrected, because no organism can function for long when consuming more energy than it's producing. The better you are at identifying and eliminating cultural limitations, the faster the plant will recover, but the short list of variables I offered all impact recovery. My FLF had some poor new growth due to lack of watering. My dean told me it didn’t grow properly because of the salts and minerals in the soil. So he recommended that I flush that plant. Soak it. Wait about 3 hours, do it again. Then wait about 30 mins and give a lift more and some fertilizer. I did that. I made sure he was good a drained before taking him back into the living room. I’ve seen videos where they suggest cutting off damaged leaves. I have a few that are. But it’s not that bad..so should I cut them off? My usual recommendation for flushing the soil is to first saturate the soil completely, wait 10 minutes to an hour, then slowly pour a volume of room temp water equal to at least 10x the volume of the pot the plant is in; so, we're pretty much in accord re that step, though I don't see any conspicuous evidence in the pictures of a high TDS (salt) level in the soil solution. Ficus usually manifest symptoms at leaf tips and margins, and there is no necrosis apparent in the images. When leaves become net users of energy instead of net producers, chemical messengers will notify plant central that it has a slacker. The plant will begin extracting mobile nutrients and breaking down other bio-compounds for use in other plant parts as part of the initial process of shedding the lazy leaf. Since the plant 'knows' whether or not it's to its benefit to shed a leaf, it's better (from the plant's POV) to leave leaves with green tissues on the plant and let them fall on their own. That said, there is very little harm in removing an unsightly leaf here and there from a healthy plant with plenty of foliage. If the plant is circling the drain - best to leave the plant to its own devices. What more can I do, to encourage the leaves to sit up again the way they did 3 months ago? Ficus is known as a genus with many species that might have difficulty restoring leaves to their original attitude once wilting has occurred. In F lyrate and elastica, leaves often only partially recover after wilting. How long the loss of turgidity (the plant's internal water pressure) lasts has considerable impact on leaves' ability to return to their formal spatial positions. There is no practical way to fix this, unless you count mechanically repositioning leaves where you want them for several weeks as being practical. Plants' natural turgidity is highest at night and when the entire soil mass is damp, when no part of the soil mass is saturated, and when TDS levels are low but sufficient to supply the plant with all the nutrients it needs to function normally. Sorry it took me a while to respond to your message - very busy at work & with family stuff for the holiday upcoming. Al

I have dimples on front porch ceiling near porch/home wall. suspended ceiling above interior wall has water stains. 150 year old home with plaster lats above suspended ceiling. plaster runs across ceiling tiles. Everything is screwed up here. Abundance of rain this spring showed leakage along valley in attic snd at valley/knee wall junctions. Water migrating across ceilings and down walls. Tracked all water migration from top down through crawl spaces and into living space. second floor all unfinished attic. So ridge vent leakage obvious. most homes all insulated and dry walled so that leakage can go on 10 years till your warranty is done before water drips thru. My home does not lie. it is all right there. They say home is old like it deserves to be destroyed. Going on five years now. An attorney and over 80 pages of pics is finally getting results. This week i hope. So when i see puckers like that, alarm bells go off in my head.