Clara - Looks like you are certainly pumping out the lumens, and plants look happy. Two questions to ponder though: at $45 a pop, these 85W CFLs + fixture are well-beyond chump change, at least for me. At some point, it must make sense to switch over to a HID lighting system. A ceiling mounted 1000W HPS, for example, would probably irradiate a good portion of your grow space, and they can't be more than a couple of hundred bucks. Second, the size of those 85W CFLs in the HD brooder lamp seems to ensure a lot of wasted lumens, and they stick out so far, a strip of Al-foil won't do much. As someone previously said, those gigantic CFLs seem much better suited to horizontal mounting in a "wing" or "half-tube" style fixture. I think the same poster described making a simple one with a double-ended screw-in socket, 8' heating duct cut in two lengthwise, and a couple of sheet metal screws. That said, the brooder lamps _are_ very flexible in their placement. Personally, I don't exceed a 55W bulb (linked below) in this fixture because, as you pointed out, I don't like my retinas fried just walking around the room. Nice thing about this particular 55W is the squat design that just about fits inside the 10.5" hemisphere. And not too shabby at 3600 lumens and $16. Here is a link that might be useful: fat 55W CFL

'U' are preaching to the choir here...

Thyrkas, I'm delighted and complimented that you're enjoying the production so much. I hope you continue to do so. I'll try and answer your queries and tell you what's what, if I can: I am a playwright and a dramatist. I took the novel The Crowded Street (as I have taken others) and I turned it (wrote it) into a drama in 10x15minute parts for BBC Radio 4 and it was recorded at BBC Drama department in Manchester. The cast was made up of professional actors - eg., the part of Muriel is played by Clare Goose, a well-known TV actress in UK. But I have no part in it, apart from 1 line which you'd never notice - in a crowd scene. I'm a writer, not an actor (though I once played the part of a dog in one of my plays, a dying cockeral in another,... I seem to be good at animal imitations! ) I love radio drama more than anything; love dramatising books like this. I hope I can go on doing it forever! I also have a wonderful producer - we've worked together for about 10 years now. And the fact that you, the discerning audience, enjoy it , makes it all worthwhile. Thank you so much for listening. Thanks, Vee, for posting it. And as you've stayed with it so far, Thyrkas and lemonhead and rosefolly and Vee (Ep. 6, as I'm writing), I hope you'll see/hear it through to the end - it has some surprises. Best of wishes to all, Dido (Diana)

Lucky you, Vee, to have seen so many stage performances. I never had the opportunity even when I lived in London to see more than a handful. I was too busy and didn't run with the right crowd, apparently. The ones I did see were entirely forgettable. Thanks, I hadn't thought of Caine, Harvey, Harris, and Finch. I always thought Harvey was such a super-serious actor that I was astonished and delighted when he did a striptease! in "The Magic Christian," that piece of insanity with Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr. I've heard about E. Flynn's wildness, but whatever it was that so many found appealing about him passed me right by. Do you think English females and males have quite different views and opinions of films? I ask because I went out with two English fellas who did not want to watch British films when we were trying to make a decision on what pictures to see; they only wanted to see American movies starring the likes of Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson, and George C. Scott. In fact, I had never heard of Bronson before this particular English boyfriend took me to see one of his films. I also saw "Patton" with this fella. He was so annoyed with the portrayal of Montgomery that it's the part I remember best. I asked both of these men why they didn't want to see English films? They both had basically the same answer but one was particularly succinct: "English actors are w__ers." Surely that attitude is no longer common, if indeed it was common back then. Are there American actors and movies that you particularly like? I haven't seen you mention many/any, if you do. Some of my female English friends have said that American actors might be dream-worthy but they're just too inaccessible for them.