Well, I agree, Calvin. But maybe some kind person could put it in the FAQ? Howard, many, many good points. And it certainly matches my experiences. I started trying to grow tropicals indoors 5 or 6 years ago. Each year it was stall or worse all winter, and took til mid July for them to recover. I finally quit on them after building a light room in my basement that I thought would be plant heaven, with 400W HID, and turned out to be anything but. So on to orchids, mostly catts and oncids, a few phals. More success there, because they are smaller. No joke intended-- you can pick them up and look closely at them, so you find things like scale before they cover half of a 4-ft tall plant! Two years in s/h with great results every summer and terrible outcomes every winter. So I went on to Aussie Gold. That was better. The catts bloomed some, but not enough for the huge investment of time and energy, even physical stress, trying to get them the right shade/sun balance all summer. As it happened, 11/12 mature phals I had last fall bloomed that spring. So gradually over the spring, the Eureka moment arrived: Grow phals! In sum, I have to say that I finally quit trying to manipulate the environment and decided to let it win-- If I want blooms, and I do, I have to grow something that thinks my light room is heaven, and that's phals. The other alternative, as Howard says, is to keep a lot of half-alive desiccating plants around all winter -- too long, too long. Couldn't stand it. And then wait til June for them to get going. No way. I'm taking it easy on myself and them, and growing what's suited to what I can give them. I started with orchids because I wanted flowers all winter, and phals provide that. So I'm content, and truthfully, glad to give up the rat race of trying to provide for ungrateful plants.

Saturday and alls well, went to work at 6 this morning(had to drive an hour away) and got back home about 3:30. Not to bad for an inventory day. Tomorrow I go back but probably will only be a ½ day situation. V, my best wishes to your Cubs. Ive always had a soft spot for them and will most likely root for them in the playoffs . Bet the poor old Brewskies though they had it dialed into after holding the lead for most of the season. What strength of character you show Denise-resisting the urge to pilfer an agave pup. I would suspect that no one at that shopping center gives a rats a*** for that agave and that your theft would go unnoticed-however you didnt hear it from me ! (Betcha if you called the property manager you could get permission !) Well, I must say that even at my worst I never caught my hair on fire lol ! I did have my share of experiences in and around Sunset Blvd though. Do you remember Wallachs Music City on Sunset and Vine??? I will be sure to take the Idylls house-hunting with me ! Hey , did you ask about noisettes? The only one I have right now is Boule de Neige , and will absolutely have Madame Alfred Carriere one day. If I had to pick. Mme Alfred would win the day. Martie, I have Star of Yelta which is quite similar to Grandpa Ott, and it re-seeds like mad. This year I was not diligent enough in my thinning and it has engulfed Sombrieuil and one of my Rudbeckias. I agree that I need to be careful with how I spend my house sale prep bucks. My house will list in the 675k range. 2 to 5k is a drop in the bucket. I expect to spend 10, mostly in plumbing issues and kitchen and window upgrades. Hiya Brenda-glad you checked in..sounds like you are a busy lady-its that harvest thing. The harvest season is quite intense here in Napa, and the company I work for furnishes many supplies to the vineyard folk. Eden, Im all for Reed listening to Cinderella , especially the Rogers and Hammerstein version- I did not discriminate gender wise and my son is even more into show tunes now than DD. When we did car trips in their younger days the soundtracks were a great way to keep them entertained. Oklahoma was definitely a favorite ! The address for Creepy Guy has been sent. I am pondering his visit . (oh, and my kids were also very fond of a video I taped of Sweeney Todd with Angela in her glory-I edited out the gory stuff. !) Ok everyone, I have some chores to do and some baseball to watch. Catch yall later ! Kathy in Napa

Jim, on my computer Houzz does break the thread up into two parts--the first 552 comments, and then the remainder. It says at the top in light green lettering "See 552 additional comments". You click on that to load the first group, and then the second 500 comments loads separately, and you read from that group if you want to. So, I guess I'm not understanding the problem. I just whiz down to the bottom where the second group ends and begin there if I want to read the latest comments, or add to them. Bonnie, can you shade that rose with an umbrella or cloth hanging on bamboo stakes? It can't hurt and might help. I can see little tents all over your front flower beds. See you on Rosy Days--not sure there will be any roses after Wednesday's heat. Diane

low voltage lighting. Have a remote transformer placed somewhere and drag low-voltage wire through the beam, these do not require a junction box and a lot of the mounting brackets and be as small as two inches. its hard to see in this pic but that is what they have done on the end of the beams you can see the fixtures. slightly hard to explain but its a very viable option for you. chrome-extension://oemmndcbldboiebfnladdacbdfmadadm/https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0597/5257/files/SPJ19-20.pdf?3496  https://www.spjlighting.com/pages/mounting-accessories