Re: Lobbii Hahahahahahahahaha. Yeah, sure is hard to be mad at such a faithful and beautiful bloomer. You stick it in some corner, just to get it out of the way, and it goes: Hi :) I made you some flowers. Ooops, I did it again. :) Hello, flower delivery. :) I love you even if you don't love me. :) flowers :) flowers :) flowers :) flowers :) It does have a unique sort of beauty, once you get over wanting it to be like the others. I honestly think, in a large space, like an entryway, it would create quite the elegant waterfall. @ GT: "honeybadger" lol lol lol lol lol lol lol I won't forget that one. Re: Macgillivrayii I had to Google macgillivrayii to see what you were talking about and I see exactly what you mean. They do not translate to photo at all! I think it's because what makes them beautiful is they are thin, but thin like a knife... hard and crisp. It's very textural. They have sharp edges. And the way they drip vertically from the vine makes their hooks seem very pronounced, like talons. Re: Polystachya I wouldn't worry about it not growing for you right away. I think most Hoyas take time off growing new foliage and then do a bunch in a long spurt. (Just like me with filing!) It's just more obvious when a large Hoya is standing still. I find it to be a very dependable grower - faster than most of my rigidas. I took the most modest 1-node cutting possible from my sister's plant last fall and over the winter it turned into a very respectable young plant. Re: Big leaf plants vs Rapid growing plants It is hard to get mad at fast growing plants. They're kind of annoying because they're always causing work and problems, swarming and tangling into things they would do best to leave alone or at best transforming into huge wreaths that fall over every time you look at them. (I should just get a big ol' wreath frame, cut a hole in the bottom for a pot, and wrap tannaensis around it.) But then you're like, aww, okay you happy little dude. Re: greentoe's new plants Ischnopus & Montana. When I think of this type of Hoya, I always think of this quote from CB 6/17/12 regarding flavescens IML 1117: This is one of those NE New Guinea species collected and published by R, Schlechter in the early 1900s. We hoya collectors of the period between 1970 and 1990 used to refer to them as "Them Yaller Thangs" as there were around a half dozen yellow flowered hoyas with varying widths of hairy borders around each flower. They were often thought to be a single species but a careful, close up look showed some of them with big fat roundish corona lobes and some long slender ones. There were also differences in the hairy border widths and shapes on the flower petals and differences in the calyx lobes and the pollinaria. I always have liked Hoya flavescens best of the bunch. So, now I also think of them as "them yaller thangs." :) Obscura is a pretty plant even green. Everyone loves it. All its forms, from the white flowered one to Sunrise, are super aggressive growers. You might as well start it on a big hoop from day one. It won't stay little long. I personally think the aff. erythrostemma has the prettiest leaves, kind of like they are exaggerated versions of the other erythrostemmas (more veined, more succulent and hard), but every erythrostemma I have collected has been sweet and pretty. It has similar flowers to mindorensis, but is much much much more attractive leaf-wise. There is only one mindorensis with pretty leaves, imo: IML 0768. The others are all like floppy dog ears, so you should just choose them for the flowers LOL. Aldrichii is a great choice!! I feel like this one gets ignored a lot, but it is such an angel. Very beautiful. Yeah, you have to have a wibergiae, for sure. There's nothing like those metallic pink splashes. It's kind of annoying that it's so big, but it's worth a big leaf plant slot. Haha I've been reorganizing my plants (more on this in another thread) and in the process I realized I was able to fill an entire flat (18 slots) with only plants with finlaysonii type leaves. I didn't realize how many I had before, because they were scattered all about. I think my favorite actual finlaysonii is EPC 057, but the various related "sp." tend to have the most pronounced veining (e.g. Kalimantan, Maenam, etc). I do, however, find Ripple Leaf to be the fastest grower, so it's easy to have a big beautiful plant quickly. It's also nice because it has thinner flatter leaves, so it displays very different from the others. I always think it's a shame that EA doesn't offer fungii instead of carnosa. We probably have enough sources of carnosa out in the world, and fungii is like carnosa +1. No offense, carnosa. I am enjoying your ordering frenzy. There's really nothing like that initial period of building up your collection, when every conversation leads to acquisitions of 8+, and you can't read a thread without tripping over a wonderful Hoya you didn't know about. I didn't go through that stage without making tons of mistakes, but it was a very happy time - like falling in love. And like romantic infatuation, it will eventually grow into a more mellow love, so I think you should live it up and give into all your wild impulses like a crazy person. You may feel more dignified once you are saying things like "I really only want one cutting - I don't have room for more," but stage 1 is waaaaaay more fun!!

I have never had a subscription to a cooking magazine - the only subscription I did have was to Illuminatrice, an Italian lighting magazine, and that was at work. The only magazines that I buy at the newsstand are Italian design magazines, some of which are quite expensive (I used to buy men's Italian fashion magazines, when I was more fashionable), and I have saved every one of them. I also buy Architectural Digest, Interiors, Veranda, etc. when they publish photos of my furniture designs, and I keep these also. My old magazine collection takes up one shelf in my garage, and I do refer to the Italian magazines from time to time for inspiration. I do collect clutter, but books and magazines are not part of that. I have one shelf of cookbooks in the hall next to the kitchen. I once bought a magazine on Feng Shui, but I decided that the magazine was clutter and got rid of it. I spent last week-end trying to declutter my bedroom because I also bought a new mattress that will be delivered tomorrow, and I want my room to look nice. Yesterday I made a runner with the fabric left over from making new drapes for my bedroom (to be able to block out light) and put it on the wide dresser beside my bed. The dresser on the other side of my bed has a runner I made from fabric left over from when I made my bedspread. I find that decorating or trying to coordinate rooms helps me get rid of clutter. However, I did put a bunch of books on the wide dresser using bookends. I don't have room for another bookcase. If I need to get more books, I will get rid of old ones that I have. Lately I have been buying and reading books on Anthropology and early human evolution. I read them at night to help me get to sleep, and so it takes a while to get through them. I cannot stand to watch Hoarders, but I will watch Clean House if I need inspiration to declutter. Making my house and yards look as beautiful as possible is one of my top priorities, and this helps me let go of clutter. I haven't gotten rid of it altogether, however, and so I think it is an on-going process. I have a hard time getting rid of old clothes that no longer fit, and I am convinced that sometime in the near future, they will fit again. Anyway, that is my goal. They may be terribly out of style or inappropriate by that time, however. Getting rid of old clothes is my biggest problem. One of the things I came across yesterday while decluttering was a printout from a Cooking Forum thread from 2005 that I started asking what was in everyone's freezer. It included a post by Ann_T on pitahaya (I happened to have some in my freezer at the time) that she had copied and pasted, bad Google translation and all. The translation was hysterically funny. Lars

Kevin, I am in Long Island, I have never heard of a home being sold by flyers. If you mean those booklets that you find in supermarkets, those fell out of favor during the sellers market because things were sold by the time the booklets printed. I look at the list of open houses weekly in Newsday, NYT and a local paper. To the extent that things are slightly out of my price range I prefer going to the open house rather than waste an agents time. However, if I fall in love you never know. The last Two houses I almost bought, one was mentioned to me by a friend who saw it on MLS (she perpetually house hunts) and knew I liked that model. The other I found through a search on MLS, mapped it out, drove to the house and called the agent on the sign. The only other house I considered buying I also found doing my own MLS search and then called the listing agent As for the OP, I definitely suggest using a local agent if people are coming to live in the specific area. For example people that will be looking at my house will want to live in my town and not the one five minutes away so it would be counterproductive to hire an agent from the other town. One thing, I have not chosen an agent but know who I would not use. I have been out at open houses to get a sense of my houses price in my area. In one case I could not find the house. I tried calling the agency on a beautiful sunday afternoon during the open house. I could not get anyone on the phone so I never made it to that house. Will not use their agency. Another house had the open house listed either on their web site or the newspaper as 1-3. I got there at 2. First the sign was barely noticeable (in contrast to another house I went to where the sign was visible 3 blocks away, makes me want to use that agency). Next the broker is all impatient with me. As I leave, she leaves. Apparently she changed the time and the open hosue was really 12-2 and she forgot to change the ad! When I mentioned the problem she said she had to go (she knew I was there to comparison shop and was not a real buyer) and apparently did not care that the buyer could still show (and it was her listing). No way would I use that agency. So bottom line, visit some open houses annonymously if possible, see how they conduct themselves

Many times I don't come up with the right tone in voice/writing to express myself, and I can be easily misunderstood. I always need an editor, and I have lots here! Thank you all so much for "editing" the wording/potential interpretation. It helped enormously! DH was estranged from his kids for quite a few years, and all three of them suddenly mellowed a couple of years ago. They established a good, stable relationship and I want to continue that. Especially after the kids lost both their parents in 14 months, so I'm kinda sorta all they have left - scary thought :-) So, if they want to camp out, fine. They now know the rules (they absolutely, positively know what behavior their father would accept and what he would go ballistic about). They agreed that they are responsible for "their" guests. If it turns into mayhem and chaos, I have a stash of wine in the basement, I will sit with a glass in my hand, eat popcorn, and watch them clean it up, fix it up, or pay for it. I'm really looking forward to this celebration, and I'm not stressing at all anymore. Probably because I am the best (or is it the worst?) procrastinator in the ENTIRE universe, and I've started working on this early enough to think through the process. I can't tell you how much help you all have been!