I try to keep posts in this journal to fandom-related topics...

...but this morning ( I woke up to this little doozy and, just. No. )

I could go on, but, gah.

これで以上です。

Friday Flora: Plants Are Jerks Edition

Pelargoniums are some of my favorite plants. They smell lovely, they respond amazingly to benign neglect, and they're sociable--no matter the variety, they will invariably send branches out toward the next closest plant.

Only, they don't always stop there. A few months ago, one of my rose geraniums sent a branch out toward the rose mint geranium, which looked like this:




Within a day, the rose geranium somehow used its proximity to make the rose mint die back to its main branch and then changed the color and shape of the rose mint geranium's leaves to mimic its own.

I relocated the poor thing to the balcony where it is now thriving...as a straight-up rose geranium.

Its new home is between the loofah and the bitter melon, and guys, these plants need help. For weeks, they have proved incapable of growing toward railings, trellises, or support stakes.

Until, that is, the rose mint geranium moved in, after which the loofah promptly shot out sideways to strangle it:





And we are talking octagon-worthy grappling here:




For the past three days, I have dutifully gone out to unsnarl the loofah from the rose mint and train its tendrils around the balcony railings instead. But wait a few hours and there it is, like clockwork, wrapped around the rose mint geranium once more.

Maybe one day it will take the hint.

これで以上です。