#《◇》 point of propagation [starter]

[akashicsystem]

“... Huh, interesting tactic.”

Alhaitham moved around the offending plant, scrutinized it and made a mental note to avoid this doorway in the future. He scanned the residence to make sure nobody saw him, and nobody was within “catching” distance. He crossed his arms upon seeing one, two, three more plants strategically placed around Ayato's house. Coming to his Christmas party was a mistake. The man was a cartoon villain on a good day. 

The only reason he had even bothered to show up was for the gift exchange. He had brought an electric tea kettle (within the budget limit, of course) but he had his eye on a specific item. Ayato had texted him a week prior to this event, with a photo of himself inside a local bookstore, holding a copy of a detective novel series Alhaitham had recently put on his ‘to-read' list. That slick bastard. Ayato had casually mentioned he was trying to pick an intellectually stimulating gift for his exchange, and Alhaitham was welcome to come and join the festivities. 

He groaned quietly and stared at the ceiling, frustrated that he was successfully baited into social interaction. It hadn't been all bad- Albedo and Tighnari had a very interesting chat about insects and their role in the ecosystem before the conversation turned to talking about their boyfriends, which Alhaitham had little to no interest in. It almost sounded like Tighnari was trying to pawn Cyno off to Albedo, which… seemed weird? Something wasn't quite adding up. 

He made his way back to the food table, grabbing more cookies to munch on while he listened to people talk. If he had a plate, he wasn't expected to participate, he found out- so it naturally became his go-to method for avoiding conversation, especially about himself. 

He let his shoulders relax and checked his watch- one more hour left, and thirty minutes until the gift exchange. Finally, some peace-

He was interrupted out of his thoughts by a tap on his shoulder and an entirely too smug soft spoken greeting.

@guardiancypress-txt

[shera-dnd]

I have decided against my better judgement to be weird about the Dawntrail MSQ

and we can't talk about an expansion set in the fantasy americas without talking about

COLONIALISM

oh yeah, we're going there baby

So disclaimer that I may be brazilian, but my ass is white as hell, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. Also if any native americans have made posts on this please let me know so I can boost their analysis as well

Also also I'm more than happy to delete this post if I mess up. I'm genuinely trying to make a thoughtful analysis, so if I fuck up just say the word and this thing is gone from this website

Oh also also also, Dawntrail MSQ spoilers ahead!

So FFXIV has had a... messy relationship with colonialism over the years

The fact that the major antagonists for the first half of A Realm Reborn a literally called "beast man tribes" is absolutely not a good start to this story

Add to that the fact that The Twelve (Eorzea's gods) are shown to be kind all powerful deities, while the Primals (the tribal gods) are evil spirits summoned to bring destruction to the world

and yeah no ARR is not good with that shit. It's EXTREMELY not good. If I hadn't been told it got better later on I would have dropped this shit before I got to Titan

But they have been taking steps to unfuck things. First we're shown that even the "civilized societies" (in this case the catholic elves) can summon Primals, then that Primal summoning isn't an actual native custom but was introduced by foreigners with malicious intent, and that not all "beast man" practice that

Then they changed the names of the "Beast Man Tribe Quests" to "Tribal Quests" and then finally to "Allied Society Quest"

Which would have been an empty gesture had like half of the post-Shadowbringer patches, as well a lot of Endwalker, not been about forming alliances with those people and working together with them, recognizing that they have as much right to the land and to life as any Eorzean, this all culminating on the Primals being summoned with the express purpose of helping you protect the world you all share

I guess they realized that they couldn't have their big bad for most of the game be the evil expansionist empire, if they didn't like actually reflect in their own imperialist fantasies they were propagating

Then the teaser trailer for Dawntrail drops and everyone in the fandom is like "wait... are we gonna do a colonialism?"

And memes were abound of how all those lessons from before don't apply to the "New World" of Tural

THANKFULLY the actual questline leading to Dawntrail helped to settle some of those worries

We're not going to Tural to explore a new uncharted land, but are actually being invited over by the local royalty in order to aid them with their right of succession. We get introduced to the nation of Tuliyollal and how it's a thriving land with its own culture and not just a "terra nil" waiting to be colonized

Still there are some worries that this is gonna turn out poorly and that we're just gonna end up being white saviors

But I think they managed to avoid that pretty well

For starters neither the Scions nor the Warrior of Light are the protagonists of this story. You're all simply supporting character's in Wuk Lamat's story

A story that centers her people, her culture, and her family

And it's not even one culture. They don't portray Tuliyollal as this monolithic mish mash of every single native american culture

No, the lands of Tural are in fact comprised of multiple different people's and nations, each of them with their own customs and traditions which are informed by their history and the lands they live in

In fact learning about their cultures and partaking in their customs is the whole point of the Rite of Succession. It's all set up so that the next Dawnservant would be someone who understands and respects each of the peoples that comprise Tural

(I could, and probably will, write about what Dawntrail has to say about what makes a good ruler)

And our girl, Wuk Lamat, is shown to be the rightful heir because she really goes out of her way to understand each of the nations and show her appreciation for their customs

Putting her well above her Sharlyaboo brother Koana, The King of Unresolved Daddy Issues Zoral Ja, and whatever the fuck is going on with Bakool Ja Ja

(I joke, I love my two headed traumatized dumbass)

Tho I will admit that this does end up giving the tribes a somewhat "planet of the hats" vibe. Like their named NPCs are diverse and interesting, but you can just assume that most random NPCs of any given people are gonna act according to the stereotype

Which is unfortunate, but I have hopes that with the next few patches and the addition of Dawntrail's own Allied Society Quests, we'll get to see more to them

But that... is only up to lvl95 and the end of the Yok'Tural (southern Tural) segment

because then we get to Xak'Tural (northern Tural) and holy shit does it feel like they drop the ball there

Like they really COULDN'T keep themselves from making Shaaloani a fucking Wild West map

Instead of doing anything with the actual cultures and histories of Native North American people, they just do wild fucking west

Because there's ceruleum in them thar hills! And apparently Koana turned most of the region into Sharlyaboos too

So we get a bunch of Wild West frontier towns mixed with native american tribes and mud brick cities. We have trains and guns and a sheriff and a duel at high noon, but now everyone got native american names

At least there's one group off to the northern side of the map who seems to stick to tradition and live in harmony with nature, and that group is shown respect by the other people of the region

so we at the very least avoid the "cowboys vs indians" crap, but my god does that region just feel bad compared to everything else they had done so far

Then we get to the big twist: THE CYBERPUNK PORTION OF THE GAME

because yes, we go full fucking cyberpunk

so turns out that a whole segment of Xak'Tural got colonized by the kingdom of Alexandria, including the lands of the Shetona (Erenville's people)

And I feel like this is the most poignant section of the MSQ when it comes to colonialism

Because here we have Alexandria, an empire that has reached the limit of what it can do sustain itself on its own world, and so has decided to spread out and colonize others in order to gain resources

We see the Shetona and other natives of the region being separated from their families and kept in isolation from the rest of their people

And tho Queen Sphene is shown to be a kind and caring ruler who gives people a choice when it comes to joining the empire, WELL SHE'S STILL THE QUEEN OF A FUCKING EMPIRE

Like her form of kindness and just stagnant peace is put in stark contrast with Wuk Lamat's own love for her people and more proactive pursuit of happiness and harmony

(again with the "what makes a ruler theme")

Also the people that choose to be assimilated into the Alexandrian Empire? Yeah, they're doing so because Alexandria has advanced medical technology and you can only receive their aid if you're a citizen

Not only that, but you have to be a working citizen. We see later on a character being denied medical aid, because he lost his job, thanks to the King's decision and at no fault of his own

yeah this is cyberpunk, not just sci-fi

ALSO can we talk about how the technology used for that medical aid and the little gizmo they give you to signify you're now a citizen, will literally erase the memory of the people you lost

So the Turali who are assimilated into Alexandrian culture not only lose ties to their culture and their loved ones, but are not allowed to grieve their loss, because what they once had is slowly being erased

How their choices add up to survive on their own OR be assimilated

How this all takes place IN NORTH FUCKING AMERICA!

THE CYBERPUNK CITY IS LITERALLY SET IN THIS WORLD'S EQUIVALENT TO THE UNITED STATES

So yeah, I don't think is is accidental. I genuinely thing that they're making a point about the realities of imperialism and colonialism, as well as taking some shots at the US while they're at it

Of course this part is still centered around Wuk Lamat, and instead of having a moment of "the only ones who can stop the evil white europeans are the GOOD white europeans", we have Wuk Lamat be the one to save the day, defeat Sphene, and save her people from the colonizing empire

So I would like to argue that everything that happens from lvl97 onwards is them picking up the ball again and making a real point

buuuut that comes at the cost of us being unable to engage with the native peoples of Xak'Tural outside of the context of colonialism

Which genuinely fucking sucks, and I hope it will be remedied with the post-Dawntrail patches

As well as handling the whole shared land situation they ended up with and how this might end up in a Land Back sort of movement, and oh boy can they mess shit up royally there

So in conclusion FFXIV has had a messy relationship with colonialism and imperialist fantasies and tropes, but the devs seem to be making a concerted effort to undo their mistakes and show respect in their depictions of american natives

They still fuck up

boy do they

but they're at least trying, and I'd say Dawntrail so far has been quite well executed

so yeah, look forward to more insane rambles like this one I guess

[faefarm]

Patch 1.4.0 - Patch Notes

Attention Fae Friends!

A new update has arrived! We want to make sure your experience in Azoria is as smooth as possible, so we’re sending out an update for all Fae Friends on Tuesday, October 17 at 10AM PST /  5 PM UTC. This is a hefty one, so please read more for full details on what you can expect from our newest patch. 

GAMEPLAY

Fixed issues that could cause you to spawn in a black void outside the map, or in a rock near the starter farm, when loading a save.

The game clock will now pause when using the storage shed or mailbox while in single player.

Fixed an issue where using keyboard shortcuts to open interface screens that should pause the game clock was not actually pausing.

Fixed an issue that could block holding to plant multiple items from working as intended.

Fixed an issue that could cause fertilizer to be applied immediately after planting seeds on wet soil.

Fixed the chance of generating a sapling using a Propagation Hive being much lower than intended.

Improved the behaviour of the Blamp waves in dungeons, to more gradually increase their presence as you go through floors, and to help with performance on lower-end devices.

Fixed an issue where Cannots could disappear when in combat near dungeon walls.

Fixed an issue causing some potion effects (such as Jar of Sadness or Jar of Bees) moving at unintended speeds depending on framerate.

Fixed an issue where opening the construction menu on your farm could result in the camera zooming to another farm location.

Slightly repositioned a signpost near the starter farm that could interfere with the placement of, and interaction with, items very close to it when using mouse on PC.

Honeycomb can now be found in the Prepared Ingredients section of the Almanac and Storage; it was previously missing a category.

PROGRESSION

Fixed an issue that could block quest progression if for any reason a required story cutscene did not play. Players who are in this state should now be able to progress.

Fixed an issue where you could back out of or cancel the dialogue after accepting a quest, resulting in it not actually being accepted.

Fixed an issue where delivering an item for a sprite quest could not count if you had a shipping contract that was also asking for the same item.

Fixed a rare issue where the order of your tools could get set incorrectly, blocking upgrading them.

Fixed an issue where festival quests could sometimes take more items than they requested, if you had them in your inventory.

Fixed an issue where clovers collected using the Vortex spell did not count towards the achievement.

Fixed an issue where Magic job quest 10 could not be progressed as a client in multiplayer.

Fixed an issue where accepting the quest Fae Farming Evolved did not grant you a Bounteous Fertilizer as intended.

XP earned from harvesting Sugar Cane will now go to Foraging, not Farming.

RELATIONSHIPS

Changed the behavior of relationship progress, based on player feedback:

Relationship points can still be earned by interacting with an NPC for the first time each day, by completing relationship quests, and by giving gifts, all at the same rate as before.

When you reach the points threshold for a date, you will still receive the mail inviting you on it, and you must read this mail in your mailbox in order to get the date option on the NPC.

You will no longer earn any relationship points from any source for this NPC, until you go on the date.

After the date, you can continue to progress again, up until the next date.

This will solve the case where players could get very high relationship progress with an NPC without ever going on a date.

For players who already have relationship progress, no progress is being reset or regressed with this change. However, if you already built a high relationship level with an NPC you had not dated, you may now get a number of date requests in a row.

A reminder that if (due to the previous behavior) you have a higher relationship level with an NPC than you would want, you can reset it in the Relationships screen.

Fixed an issue where an NPC could appear as your spouse without you marrying them. Following this update, only an NPC you have actually had a wedding with will show as your spouse.

Fixed an issue where quitting the game between paying for a wedding and it being held could result in the wedding not taking place and the relationship being stuck at “Fiancé”. Players who were in this stuck state will now correctly move on to the “Spouse” status with this NPC.

Added a fix-up to help with a situation where the day ending in multiplayer while in the wedding outfit selection screen could cause the wedding to not occur, and you to be stuck at “Fiancé”.

Players who were in this stuck state will now have their wedding automatically scheduled on the next available day, with the Fae outfit selected (although all three will be added to their inventory after the wedding).

Please note that the causing bug here can still occur (and will be fixed in a future update) but if you encounter it, leaving and reloading your save will now trigger the fix-up.

Fixed a crash that occurred if you reset your relationship with Pyria while in the Dating, Getting Serious, or Spouse statuses.

Fixed an issue where the view could be obscured if you initiated a date while sitting down.

Fixed an issue blocking clients in a multiplayer session from receiving date requests.

Fixed unintended symbols appearing in dialog when a wedding took place in a multiplayer session.

ANIMAL CARE

Fixed animals getting into a state where they no longer produced materials.

Fixed a number of issues that could result in breeding being canceled, and animals being returned to their coops.

Fixed an issue where sold animals could reappear in your barns after saving and loading the game.

Fixed an issue where animals from the first and second farms would appear at the most recently-placed Animal Lure, regardless of which farm it was placed at.

Removed the brush status icon from appearing in the ledger next to animals that cannot be brushed.

MULTIPLAYER

Fixed an issue that could occur where clients joining a multiplayer session did not correctly go through the join process, arriving as the default character (with no character creator) and missing key tools.

Alongside this fix, players who are detected to be in this bad state will be returned to the character creator to correctly set up their character as a new one - this will unfortunately result in lost progress for players who were able to continue despite missing key items, as we will reset their progress to get them back into a good state to play.

Fixed an issue where transferring items from the storage shed or crafting stations in multiplayer sessions could result in them being lost or overwriting an item already in your inventory.

Fixed an issue where clients playing on Switch would be disconnected after pressing the Home button on the system.

Fixed an issue where the game client could become temporarily unresponsive when accepting a multiplayer invite or choosing to Host Online in the Steam version of the game.

Fixed an issue that blocked clients of a multiplayer session receiving the "Interested in Dyes?" letter in their mailbox, stopping them from being able to claim the free dye set. Affected players should now receive this and be able to claim these dyes.

Fixed an issue where Eutats and Ember Eutats attacks did not damage clients in a multiplayer session.

Fixed an issue causing jumping/diving animations in water to not animate correctly when playing as a client in a multiplayer session.

Fixed an issue where the map tracker did not correctly point to other players if they were in a dungeon.

You will now receive a notification on the right of the screen when you receive a Phoenix Labs friend request, as well as if someone accepts one that you send.

INTERFACE:

Fixed an issue where an expired limited-time quest (such as a festival quest) could leave an unclearable notification in the Quest Log.

Improved the behaviour of the Graphics Settings screen, adding an Apply button and a countdown before automatically reverting.

Fixed an issue that could cause quest completion banners to appear as blank when appearing before a chapter completion banner.

Fixed an issue where the input prompt for removing players in the World Management screen was missing.

Fixed some unintended overlapping visual elements in the World Management screen.

Fixed an issue where the header of the Coordination Wheel's Build option was hidden.

Fixed an overlap between the "next day" panel and the scroll prompt in the End of Day screen.

The details panel panel of the Tools Progression screen can now be scrolled with mouse wheel on PC.

Removed a message that would incorrectly tell you that you can only sleep in your main house, when interacting with a bed in another house. As a reminder, you only get the coziness-based stat boosts if you sleep in the relevant house’s bed.

Fixed an issue that required pressing select/back inputs twice for them to function on PC on the first day of a new season.

Fixed an issue that could block selecting a body type in the Character Creator with mouse.

The current build version of the game will now show in the bottom of the Settings screen, to assist with bug reports and Player Support investigations.

INTERNATIONALIZATION

Fixed an issue where too many items would appear in the Pinned Quest UI at once when playing in Japanese, Korean, or Chinese.

Improved handling of line breaking when playing with system language set to Japanese.

Improved the display of numbers, as well as the date, when playing in Japanese.

Fixed the "Expired Contract" text on the End of Day screen displaying in English while playing in other languages.

Fixed some text in the Coziness menu displaying in English while playing in other languages.

Fixed emote names showing in English when in a quest objective, while playing in other languages.

Fixed an issue causing the Copyright section of the Credits to not show when playing in non-English languages.

Improved Japanese localization.

MISCELLANEOUS:

Fixed an issue that resulted in incorrect dye colours after dyeing one outfit, then switching to another.

Fixed a rendering issue that could cause some grass to show as the wrong colour.

Fixed a rendering issue that could result in some trees to show as low-quality versions during their regrowth phases.

Fixed an issue where resetting Graphics Settings to Default did not reset the Resolution option.

Fixed an issue where launching the game on one monitor and moving it to another did not allow for resolutions supported by the new monitor.

Fixed a number of typos in English and other languages.

Thank You

We wanted to give a great big Thank You all to the amazing people who submitted bug reports and are able to help us pinpoint these issues! If you spot any issues, please update us through our main support page.

You can also join us on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Discord to share your experience with us in Azoria. 

We’ll see you in-game!

Sincerely,

The Fae Farm Team

[mandsleanan]

Remember how the pandemic social distancing made everyone go a little nuts?

Animal shelters were emptied, horses fresh off the track were being snatched up sight unseen for thousands of dollars, and state and national parks' traffic has surged to the point that it's harming them.

And then you have the Houseplant Hobby.

The demand for houseplants was already on the rise before COVID-19, and it shot up another 18% during the pandemic. And vendors responded by increasing prices 15%, with plans to continue to do so for at least 2021.

You see this vine? Pretty, isn't it?

Rex begonia vines (Cissus discolor) were always kind of an intermediate-level (Glasshouse Works considers them difficult) houseplant, which is what they are half the year if you live north of Zone 9. None of this has changed, except now more people want them and are willing to pay more.

When I bought my pair of vines back in 2016, they were maybe...eight bucks apiece for a 3" pot? Seven years later, they seem to average about twice that for a plant of the same size, and the 2" is eight bucks. Remember what I said about the price inflation?

While browsing live plants at a reptile expo, (Same one where we picked up Mulberry) one of the vendors had a single cutting on display for....$15. Not a starter. Not a rooted cutting. A string of vine fresh off the plant, for 15 USD.

If that seems like bullshit, it is. Look at Mulberry's stupid face to cleanse your brain:

For clarity, I don't recommend paying for the majority of cuttings, at least not beyond shipping expenses. There's always the chance they'll just fail, especially when you tack on the stress of transport. Buying cuttings is popular on Etsy, where vendors will charge you starter plant prices for each one, in addition to shipping and sometimes handling charges.

Anyway, I was so pissed off at the blatant price-gouging that instead of putting the overwinter clippings in the compost, I'm going to try to propagate them all.

I've never tried to propagate this species. We'll see how they do.

[jaehaerysiitargaryen]

| a starter for @casterlygldcs & @leolefford | | setting: a private meeting place in the reach |

Meeting them would ring suspicious to anyone who already held their suspicion of the green dragon. Green. A color he meant to hate, abhor for what it did to his house and yet he felt himself drawn to the identity. The truth of his identity. The connection with Daenerys was tenuous at best, she trusted him as much as she didn’t, and he supposed it was easier to act when the tension between them had grown since his taking of Storm’s End. Jaehaerys wouldn’t live in the what if or the gazes of those around him. It became clear the day he made the choice to cut down the great weirwood tree of the Red Keep. The sound, the view of Tyland coming to him and speaking to him. Reminding him. Of course. It only made sense. The man only spoke to him in truths and he would hold on to what was said.

When the letter was sent he requested for both men to be available for this discussion. Perhaps Tyland knew all along it would come to this point, perhaps he waited as he guided his hand quietly over the choices. Jaehaerys knew waiting any longer would force blond shed on them and he wished to take what was his with far more ease. He didn’t need to take it by force because he would win. He settled in the Stormlands, and there were more pro than anti Targaryens and all would rise against anyone coming to challenge them. Thirty thousand men. Sparse population compared to other regions but, he wasn’t fighting other regions. He was good with numbers and thirty thousand could go into 15 thousand as many times as it wanted to, he wanted it to be peaceful. It needed to be peaceful. Blood would be shed. As it was the case of taking the throne, but bloodshed didn’t have to translate to civil war.

“Thank you for meeting me here.”

Jaehaerys walked over to the door and locked it then he pulled down the velvet cape, even the windows were covered. Their only light coming from the candles around the table. Jaehaerys took his seat, straightening up as he leaned back against the seat.

“Our discussions after the iron battle, it is time we see me married for propagation is important for all royal lines. Especially for Kings.”

[trinabraxton]

I have 1 half Arab grandparent and consequently all of the jewish people that have educationally come forward to explain and confirm they’re personally not and many people BECAUSE OF DISPLACEMENT are not biologically strongly middle eastern . It’s not a competition because it’s not the point I’d like to make but typically The ones beating me out in Levantine DNA are Mizrahi Jews , meaning they’re from there . The point is not to flex there’s a multitude of bad reasons why jewish people collectively tend to float at low scores of middle eastern DNA starters they were exiled by the Roman’s, they’re constantly being removed or told to get out, it’s not like Israelis aren’t making valid points it’s that they don’t know anything as a society so they’re fixated on this and not things such as not every jewish person is middle eastern to begin with , lots of Jews are white ? Unless they’re not. There being Ethiopian Jews does not make a white Jew Ethiopian but they think it does because they’re being fed snippets of true facts as a universal truth in order to propagate and win support and to get people to move into this colonization project .

[alinaparis]

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[skinandinkgirl]

The Beginning of a Transition of Personal Garden Space

This journey starts in 2014. The space I am living in currently, my late partner and I purchased in February of 2014 with the intent to become as self-sustainable as possible in the middle of an urban area. The property we purchased is 3/4 of an acre, which in the area the property is located, is a very large chunk of land. With that in mind, from the moment we moved into the house we started developing the ground outside into usable space for food-based plants. The very first thing that we did was to rip out the hostas which had overtaken the entire side yard. My oldest child and I spent three- or four-days hand digging and ripping out the rhizomes from the ground and disposing of them so that they could not continue to propagate. I cannot begin to describe the quantity of this particular plant and how invasive it had truly become. Fast forward to 2024, ten years later, and somehow this plant has decided to reemerge on the side of my house where the Hosta apocalypse occurred.

The next phase of the process began by converting the backside yard into plantable raised beds. We purchased a portable outside greenhouse to place on the back porch for starting seedlings. It had about six or seven shelves and included basic kitchen staples. The basics always include tomatoes, greens, beans and peas of some kind. That year there were bad rainstorms, but one was particularly bad. I was at work when I got a text from my partner with a picture of the portable greenhouse in pieces all over the yard. The wind had gotten to such a point that it was ripping down electric lines in Clermont County and two months’ worth of seedlings were destroyed in a moment. As depressing as it was, we ended up biting the bullet and purchasing store bought plant starters for the garden. Tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, lettuces, cabbage and a variety of other greens, peas, and beans were planted in the raised beds.

As the tomatoes started to ripen, they of course all started ripening at the same time. The whole point of having a garden is to be able to have fresh food available and to be able to put aside more for the future. I grew up in a food insecure household so having reliable food sources has always been a concern of mine. I grew up learning how to process those foods that we grew utilizing the following food preservation techniques: water bath canning, pressure canning, dehydrating etc. This having been said, the tomatoes went a little buck wild. The month prior, our household had already survived the cucumber invasion and the zucchini stampede. The mistake was made of planting too many of those varieties, so we had pickled, froze and baked as many as we could of the previous vegetables. By the time the tomatoes made their entrance, we were already exhausted. At one point we were harvesting 20 to 30 lbs. of tomatoes every four or five days. At that point, I only had a regular freezer on our refrigerator and no extra freezer storage that we have now, so we did not have the ability to freeze the overabundance and can it later. That summer at best guess I canned about 200-quart sized jars of different tomato styles; stewed, juice, salsa, and sauce.

One thing that we truly focused on in the beginning of the conversion of yard space was making sure that the plants that we were introducing were not invasive species, and that we were utilizing the space properly. This of course does not mean that mistakes were not made. It wasn't until a few years afterwards that one mistake that I realized was that I planted a mint in the front side yard. Had I thought back to my childhood, I would have remembered that any plant in the mint family is highly invasive when left unchecked. Even when it is culled consistently it is still exceedingly difficult to control in open ground versus in a pot or container. One of the other mistakes that we made was being overambitious in the first year in the quantity of things that we planted. Because both of us were working full time combined with having a new home, doing all of this at the same time was exhausting.

That years planting season ended with several lessons learned, good and bad, and the plan for the following year started being created.

[freewillacquired]

Massive Mutation || open to mutuals

{ This starter involves the movie version of Nemesis (who is originally Matt Addison) morphing into the "second form" from the games, bringing one of the more evolved forms of Nemesis into the live action movie verse. I'm leaving it open as to where and when this could occur. It could be that he was deployed against your muse and they were fighting and the trauma of the fire brought back his memories. Or it could be that your muse was already an ally and a bad encounter with undead or other mutations caused him to catch fire somehow. Run with it however you like! - - - - -

Surviving the "sanitation" of Raccoon City had seemed to make the virus inside him more volatile. Having little to work with but his brain and a husk of what he'd formerly been, the virus had managed to regenerate him completely, with a few interesting additions, like tentacles. Since then, the virus seemed to not be willing for things to get to that point ever again, to a point where it had almost gone down with him.

Nemesis could see it in the way he healed faster, almost instantly, as well as in the partial autonomy of his tentacles. The virus wanted more of a front seat in his life, to make sure that the close call they'd had back in Raccoon didn't happen again. He felt like he should have felt protected and safer, but really all it did was creep him out. The way Nemesis saw it, the stronger the virus became and the more changes it made to his body, the farther away from himself he was being pulled. The less human he was.

Which was what made this particular incident so terrifying for him. The virus could deal with most wounds, from stabbing to gunshots and even amputations. Limbs could regenerate within minutes, and wounds could be stitched back together with little virally-produced, fleshy fibers. But fire? Fire was a problem, because not only was it devastatingly and swiftly destructive to living tissue, but the heat was deadly to the virus. Heat denatured DNA, degraded proteins, and made it more difficult for the virus to function and propagate itself. So when Nemesis caught fire during an unfortunate encounter, the virus... went a bit overboard.

It was painful as he felt his bones cracking and flesh stretching, like he was being pulled apart by unseen forces. After the stretching came the growing, as his bones thickened and his muscles grew back larger and more complexly layered than before. Clothes were now a thing of the past, much to the mortification of his own modesty. Whatever the fire hadn't destroyed was ripped to shreds by his evolving body. Bits of leather still clung to him, stretched taut over his arms and dangling from his torso, but that was all that remained. The fire which had been consuming him was strangely doused by his own blood as muscle grew and grew until new skin formed. He roared through all of this, with what might have otherwise been human screams now unrecognizable as such. But the virus wasn't done yet...

All over his head and back, Nemesis grew a thick, bony, protective layer, complete with horn-like spines on his back. Now about twice as large as he was before and hunched over so as to make bipedal locomotion almost completely impossible, he sat panting on all-fours once the process had run to completion, panicking both from the pain and the change in perspective. He couldn't see himself beyond looking down at his hands and arms, but he was sure something horrible had become of him.

"What... the HEEEELL?!" Nemesis yelled in utter panicked disbelief, his voice deeper and more animal-like than it had been before. Now what the hell, indeed, was he even supposed to do with this? He wanted to be human again, not to continue to evolve into something more viral, more... monstrous.

[mariacallous]

At first blush, the results of Taiwan’s national elections last month read like a clear rebuke of China’s coercive reunification agenda. Despite Beijing’s incessant branding of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as “separatist,” Taiwanese voters extended the DPP’s presidential reign for an unprecedented third consecutive term. International headlines hailed the election as a major “setback” for China, which had warned that casting a ballot for the DPP was tantamount to voting for war with the mainland. Some media even framed the DPP’s victory as an act of defiance by the Taiwanese people, rebuffing Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s assertion in his recent New Year’s address that reunification between China and Taiwan is “inevitable.”

But the political fallout following Taiwan’s election is more nuanced. Dig deeper, and Taiwan’s fractured electoral outcome foreshadows political divisions that China will exploit. It also suggests that Beijing’s pre-election meddling may have actually succeeded in advancing Xi’s dual-pronged strategy of undermining popular support for the DPP and sowing societal discord to reduce resistance to China’s reunification calls.

For starters, while the DPP’s presidential candidate, William Lai, won decisively, his victory did not translate into an overwhelming mandate because he secured only 40 percent of the vote in a three-way race. The two opposition candidates, representing the Kuomintang (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), garnered the remaining 60 percent of ballots. Minor differences aside, both opposition parties set themselves apart from the DPP by pledging to stabilize cross-strait relations through dialogue with the mainland, a prospect China dismissed as impossible under a DPP-led administration.

Beijing undoubtedly took note of these distinctions. Before the election, Chinese-owned social media platforms popular in Taiwan, like TikTok, amplified content that portrayed the opposition candidates and their parties positively, according to analyses conducted by Mandiant, Numbers Protocol, Doublethink Lab, and other cyberthreat firms. These platforms simultaneously unleashed a deluge of disinformation denigrating Lai and the DPP, including false claims the DPP collaborated with Washington to build bioweapons—an echo of Moscow’s propaganda claims against Ukraine. In other instances, Chinese bot farms established internet profiles impersonating genuine Taiwanese news websites and began propagating seemingly legitimate broadcast clips aligning with China’s preferred political narratives about reunification.

Evaluating disinformation’s impact on elections is extremely difficult—not just in Taiwan. But the Chinese campaigns almost certainly fostered skepticism toward Lai and his agenda. Lai still won, but his share of the vote fell far behind that of outgoing President Tsai Ing-wen, under whom Lai served as vice president. With all of the votes now counted, Lai’s result was 17 points lower than Tsai’s victory in 2020 and 16 points lower than her victory in 2016, when she vanquished KMT candidate Han Kuo-yu and third-party challenger James Soong.

More importantly for Beijing than Lai’s weak mandate, his presidential victory did not translate into DPP success in the parliamentary election held on the same day. The DPP lost its legislative majority, shedding 10 seats, while the KMT and TPP gained 14 and three seats, respectively. Now, the KMT controls Taiwan’s parliament, with Han—humiliatingly defeated by Tsai eight years ago—tapped to serve as speaker. This new reality augurs bitter infighting over Lai’s political agenda, not least defense priorities and other policies to deter Chinese aggression. This is an outcome Beijing likely welcomes.

Practically speaking, this could spell trouble for Lai’s plans to sustain several Tsai-era initiatives, including Taiwan’s indigenous submarine program and plans to extend military conscription from four months to one year—a move the KMT campaigned against. Opposition legislators, nervous about provoking Beijing, could also employ obstructionist tactics to complicate Lai’s other stated goal of strengthening defense, diplomatic, and trade ties with Washington. Amid the discord over security policy, Taiwan’s ability to present a unified defense against external threats could weaken, leaving it vulnerable to Beijing’s coercion and ill-prepared to repel a potential invasion, blockade, or other hostile act.

China’s public response to the election, while swift, hardly denoted a nation sulking over the defeat it was supposedly handed by Taiwanese voters. If anything, Beijing’s bombast bordered on triumphant. Seizing on the fragmented outcome, China dismissed Lai and the DPP as out of touch with “mainstream public opinion in Taiwan.” Beijing also insisted that the result did not alter the fundamental nature or trajectory of cross-Strait relations, suggesting Beijing views the opposition’s gains as validating its view that Taiwan’s population remains receptive to a reunification dialogue. Tellingly, China has not ordered new military drills encircling Taiwan since the election, likely because its months-long marathon of maneuvers already achieved their intended purpose of undermining popular support for the DPP.

Xi’s response, above all others, loomed largest. Two days after Lai’s victory, the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) news magazine and official theoretical journal, Qiushi, published a speech Xi delivered to party elites about Taiwan. In it, Xi hammered home the importance of “developing and strengthening patriotic, pro-unification forces in Taiwan,” a reference to parties, politicians, and elements of the population opposed to the DPP. Xi also championed the United Front—the arm of the Chinese Communist Party responsible for international political warfare and disinformation operations—in aggressively countering “separatist acts of Taiwanese independence.” In Beijing’s eyes, separatism can be anything Taiwan does to maintain international relations and evade Beijing’s coercive tactics—it does not have to be a formal declaration of independence, which Lai has repeatedly ruled out.

On their own, Xi’s remarks hardly broke new ground. What is significant is that Xi actually delivered the speech not in response to the election but 18 months ago—more precisely, one week before then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi traveled to Taiwan to meet Tsai, a trip that ignited China’s drive to stoke invasion fears and delegitimize the DPP.

In other words, these were not Xi’s post-election musings. They were his pre-election marching orders to the CCP’s ideological foot soldiers and cyberwarriors. While Beijing may have fallen short in securing the DPP’s outright defeat, the strategically timed release of Xi’s speech appears aimed at validating his approach—one that blends disinformation, economic coercion, and threatening military drills—to advance China’s reunification agenda. The speech’s declassification also underscores Xi’s intention to sustain what he likely views as a winning political warfare strategy, with the goal of further undermining popular support for the DPP and galvanizing opposition unity.

Just how might this unfold?

For starters, China’s military drills to intimidate Taiwan’s population may soon resume, with Beijing stepping up patrols off the coast of Taiwan’s Kinmen archipelago. Politically, Beijing will likely move quickly behind the scenes to encourage collaboration between anti-DPP legislators, gently prompting them to support joint initiatives that undermine Lai’s agenda. Prior to local elections in 2026, China may also resume providing financial and other support to opposition candidates promoting closer cross-strait ties, as Taiwanese prosecutors found Beijing to have done ahead of last month’s election. Such meddling will almost certainly occur alongside covert Chinese efforts to identify, cultivate, and ultimately back a consensus candidate capable of challenging Lai in 2028, a herculean task predicated upon fostering KMT-TPP unity through facilitated negotiations and backroom politicking.

In tandem, Beijing will likely offer preferential treatment, including market access, to Taiwanese businesses supporting closer ties with China—in hopes of luring the business community away from the DPP. China could also offer economic incentives and investment opportunities that benefit regions or industries traditionally represented by the KMT and TPP, thereby encouraging these parties to continue supporting policies that align with Beijing’s long-term interests. Targeted measures could include increased Chinese imports of agricultural products from rural areas that have historically been KMT strongholds, as well as new manufacturing investments in KMT-controlled industrial zones.

Beyond politics and economics, Beijing will wield its considerable control over social media to champion narratives highlighting the benefits of closer cross-strait relations, albeit on Xi’s terms. China may also seek to restart once-dormant people-to-people exchanges to deepen ties between regions and groups perceived as anxious over the DPP’s agenda, which would help lay the groundwork for broader opposition support during future election cycles. Lastly, China will double down on diplomatic efforts to reduce Taiwan’s international standing, as reflected in its convincing the Pacific island of Nauru to switch recognition from Taipei to Beijing two days after Lai’s election victory. Beijing’s next target is likely Tuvalu, which would then leave Taiwan with only 10 partners recognizing it, rather than Beijing.

All told, Taiwan’s election result does not mark the dawn of a DPP dynasty, nor does it spell the end of China’s reunification ambitions by whatever means necessary. If anything, the DPP’s diminished standing suggests Beijing will double down on the political war it is already waging and winning, rather than start an armed one it could lose. That prospect, however, should be of little solace to Taiwan, where the battleground has shifted from missiles to mandates, and where resilience against political subversion remains the ultimate defense.

[akashicsystem]

《 TAG MASTERPOST 》

[whiskeynovember]

Looking good, looking fine!

i think some of the pepper leaves got cut. the newly planted basil looks sturdy. i see more cherry pepper seedlings sprouting as well as one of the serrano peppers.

the black diamond watermelon and yellow squash are fucking rockstars at growing while the sugar babies are taking their time and the green squash is recovering from the fucking worm buffet. 🐛

went through and cut the blossoms off of the Thai basil. they were all looking so perky, now one of them is getting sad again. I'm hoping me cutting the blossoms off will help it focus on other things.

I'm putting the pineapple sage propagations outside because they need more sunlight than what I can give them inside. I'll be honest, none of them are doing too well and I don't see a hint of roots on any of them. the tips are shriveling up and dying. I'm not even sure where a new growth point would pop in.

i love this plant so much, though. i have thoroughly succeeded in killing it. 😭. i should see if I can find some seeds online, just in case.

(didn't find any! i found some starter plants, but I don't want that. ugh... why is it so hard to find?!!)

i made a small propagation station outside using the sushi box. threw a few seeds of my struggling plants into them and now we wait. i did rosemary, Korean mint, common chive, garlic chive, cucamelon, and bell pepper. the cucamelon in the pot is doing ok. still only the 2 seedlings and one looks like it's stunted. 2 might be more than enough, though... but fuck it.

my pine berries are sprouting! none of the regular strawberry seeds I've harvested are.

i am trying to figure out what to do with the chaos area. what should I put there or should I leave it be?

[upliftingfloral]

The Benefits of Growing Your Own Flowers | Flower Delivery in Dubai

The Benefits of Growing Your Own Flowers

Flowers have been admired for their beauty and symbolism for centuries. From their mesmerizing colors and enchanting fragrances to their cultural significance in various celebrations and rituals, flowers play a significant role in our lives. While many people enjoy receiving flowers as gifts or buying them from florists, there is a unique joy that comes from growing your own flowers. In this blog, we’ll explore the numerous benefits of nurturing your blossoms right in your own garden.

1. Therapeutic and Stress-Relieving

Gardening, in general, is known to have therapeutic effects, and growing flowers is no exception. Spending time tending to your plants and watching them flourish can be a calming and meditative experience. The act of gardening promotes mindfulness, reduces stress, and has been linked to improved mental well-being. The simple pleasure of seeing your efforts blossom into beautiful flowers can uplift your spirits and provide a sense of accomplishment.

2. Connection with Nature

In our fast-paced, technology-driven world, it’s easy to lose touch with nature. By cultivating your flower garden, you can reconnect with the earth and its natural cycles. Observing the growth process, learning about soil, sunlight, and water requirements, and nurturing your plants instill a sense of responsibility towards the environment and a deeper appreciation for the beauty of nature.

3. Customization and Personalization

When you grow your flowers, you have complete control over the types of blooms and colors you want in your garden. You can handpick your favorite flowers and design the garden to suit your taste and style. This level of customization allows for unique arrangements, creating a personal oasis that reflects your personality and brings you joy every time you step outside.

4. Environmental Benefits

Home flower gardens contribute positively to the environment in multiple ways. They provide a habitat for bees, butterflies, and other pollinators, essential for the reproduction of various plants, including food crops. This helps in preserving biodiversity and ensures the health of the ecosystem. Additionally, growing flowers at home reduces the need for commercially produced flowers that may involve the use of harmful pesticides and long-distance transportation, thereby lowering your carbon footprint.

5. Cost-Effective

While it’s true that establishing a flower garden might require some initial investment in tools, seeds, or plants, it can ultimately save you money. Once your garden is established, you won’t need to buy flowers as often, especially during the blooming season. Additionally, with proper care and propagation, some flowers can self-seed, allowing you to expand your garden at no extra cost.

6. Educational Opportunity

If you have children or are interested in botany, growing flowers provides an excellent educational opportunity. It offers a hands-on experience of learning about plant life cycles, the role of pollinators, and the importance of sustainable gardening practices. It can spark curiosity and create a deeper understanding of the natural world.

7. Social and Community Benefits

A beautiful flower garden can become a conversation starter and a gathering point for friends, family, and neighbors. Sharing the joy of your blooms with others can foster a sense of community and help build meaningful connections. You can even exchange cuttings or seeds with fellow gardening enthusiasts, further enriching your gardening experience.

In conclusion, growing your flowers goes beyond the aesthetic appeal. It’s a journey of self-discovery, mindfulness, and appreciation for nature’s wonders. From the therapeutic effects to the environmental benefits, the advantages of cultivating your flower garden are numerous and profound. So why not embark on this colorful adventure and watch your garden bloom with beauty and love? Happy gardening!

[smhalltheurlsaretaken]

Stumbled upon your master list of SW meta you wrote, and enjoyed reading through some of them, especially the ones that examined and defended the jedi order. I point to the jedi order in particular because when you pointed out that the number of jedi in the galaxy are proportionally smaller compared to a planet with a population in the trillions, it reminded me of a bad take regarding the order (which is conflated with the whole "the jedi are actually the bad guys" in SW): that the jedi are eugenicists because their adoption of force sensitive children. This never sat right with me given that the jedi never seemed the type to be concerned with propagating their numbers in some form of "purity" (genetic or force sensitivity wise). Any chance you can gleam into the nitty-gritty of this take's unsavory implications?

OOf, that's an old ask, and that reminds me that I really need to update that masterlist 😅 (and me saying that is an even older draft, oops 😂)

Okay, the idea of the Jedi being *eugenicists* is SO out of left field that I feel like it doesn't even deserve to be really addressed so much as mocked, because words mean things.

To be quite fair, I don't think I've ever seen anybody seriously use that word. (It may very well have happened tho, I just can't remember somebody seriously making the claim and sticking to it.) Even the infamous KT rant (see below) doesn't call them that - the extremely weird and frankly absurd take is that they embody supremacist ideas and that people who are into them believe there is such a thing as an inherently superior person. She does use the word "Nazi" (just wow), but I don't think she was going for the eugenics part, just the run of the mill white supremacy theories. People on both sides of the argument may have misquoted/misinterpreted her on that though.

(Seriously woman, why were you even writing for Star Wars?! YOU DIDN'T EVEN LIKE IT!)

Now, eugenics? (This post is so weird to write, I can't even) ⇊

It is LAUGHABLE to use it in relation to the Jedi Order, because as you accurately put it, the Jedi just aren't interested in... making babies.

Do they force their members to procreate, even artificially? Absolutely not.

Are they seeking to improve the Order by only taking in the healthiest, strongest, most powerful children? No. They were ready to reject Anakin, for one thing.

Are they studying how to arrange reproduction in the rest of the galactic population? No.

Is there a ban on non-Jedi Force sensitives having children of their own? No. Are they forced or even strongly encouraged to have children of their own? No.

Do Jedi control who Force-sensitives are allowed to have children with? No.

Do Jedi test for Force-sensitivity and keep records of it? Yes. But they don't seem to keep genealogies - there's nothing that says the list in the Holocron is a permanent one either - rather, the way it's phrased and the way there's only babies on it, names are probably erased eventually. And the purpose of the list has nothing to do with increasing the occurence of Force-sensitivity.

Are non-Jedi Force sensitives forced by law to give up their kids? No.

Do Jedi automatically take in Force-sensitive children anyway? No. Bardotta and Dathomir are right there and nobody's bothering them.

Is the Order ableist? No. We even see plenty of disabled Jedi and nobody is throwing them out. (Amputees like Anakin and elderly people like Yoda and Tera Sinube, for starters. Also Prosset Dibs, or Tahl in Legends).

The Force isn't even proven to be reliably 'transmissible' from one generation to the next - the Force 'being strong' in particular families may just as easily be for more spiritual reasons depending on how you want to look at it. Because, you know, Star Wars isn't all literal.

IT'S JUST SO DUMB.

NOTHING ABOUT HOW THE ORDER WORKS HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH WHAT THAT WORD MEANS.

(I'm sorry I'm not dissing you for the ask I just don't get how anybody could ever have said that 😂😭)

[thepnictogenwing]

a critique of pure rationalization

Western society is desperately irrational (just look at the @elonmusk cult for starters) even while it idolizes “logic” and “reason”; every ranting ideologue whose talk consists of nothing but memorized propaganda points claims to be a champion of FACTS and LOGIC. we’re at the endpoint of a social trend that started centuries ago—the transference of the values of Christian ideology into the secular world. that which was orthodox and therefore Good™, in the Christian term, became “rational”; that which was heretical and therefore Evil™ became “irrational”. the modern Western ideologue habitually accuses their opponents of being not merely wrong in their facts or their logic, but crazy and deluded—hence (conveniently) not worth debating. why bother discoursing in a rational matter with people you’ve diagnosed as being [expletive deleted] in the head?

needless to say this general attitude has been very bad for logic and reason. the Internet is stuffed full to bursting with “debaters” who never actually debate; to them, “debate” is merely a matter of asserting the same few talking points over again, and steadfastly ignoring all counterarguments and refutations of the talking points as “irrational” and therefore fit only to be ignored. none of these champions of FACTS and LOGIC are very interested in examination of their own positions; such rational scrutiny would threaten the integrity of their ideology (which, by the way, they also usually pretend isn’t ideological, because “ideological” and “irrational” mean more or less the same thing in modern Western intellectual discourse) so they’re not interested. everyone’s running around in public having non-debates, starting non-arguments based on pre-decided conclusions.

basically we’ve seen a mass confusion and conflation of reason with rationalization. the reasonable person accepts that their assertions and their inferences are open to question, and allow other people to question them; “debate” is meaningless unless the debater accepts the possibility that their position may be unsound. but the modern ideologue refuses to accept the possibility of making serious mistakes. in their view, their belief system is already completely worked out, nigh-flawless, accounting for everything—a seamless fabric of FACTS and LOGIC, usually worked out with the assistance of fellow ideologues. it’s not reason that preoccupies such ideologues, but rationalization—the process of defending oneself rhetorically with statements that superficially resemble rational arguments. a rationalization is not a true logical argument unless it’s defended as part of a chain of reasoning, which is almost never done. instead the rationalization is intended to end debate. it’s supposed to be a solid block of FACT or LOGIC that’s self-evident and unanswerable.

let me supply an example: suppose you’re a COVID19 denialist, scared by talk of vaccination and quarantine measures, and therefore you’ve decided a priori to denounce these things as mere lies and fraud, part of some “media” conspiracy or whatever. your decision to deny the reality of COVID19 isn’t a rational one—but you’ll probably never admit that, least of all to yourself, because it’s the Western way to deny at all times that emotions play any role in your decisions. the proper and respectable Western person is always “rational”, which means that the COVID19 denialist must pretend that their rejection of vaccination and public-health measures against COVID19 was the result of rational decision-making and not simple fear or factionalism.

in steps rationalization to save you. there’s a multitude of public forums, propaganda outlets, YouTube channels, and other media crafted specifically to supply quasi-rational excuses for COVID19 denialism. most of these are satellites of the vast system for publication and propagation of right-wing diatribe that’s been extremely well funded and subsidized for many decades now. and indeed most of the rationalizations in support of COVID19 denialism are familiar right-wing propaganda points, retooled to apply specifically to COVID19. it’s “too expensive” to treat COVID19 as a public-health problem. it’s not “common sense” to demand that people wear face masks or limit their public gatherings. it’s “government overreach” or even “tyranny” for civil government to demand vaccination or impose quarantine measures on the population. and so forth: all of these arguments are merely variations on well-worn conservative talking points. an important point to make about rationalizations is that the ideologue who places their trust in rationalizations feels like they come out on top merely by having a lot of them on hand—in their mind, more “reasons” is always better, even if the given “reasons” contradict each other. for example, the COVID19 denialist is likely to simultaneously assert that COVID19 isn’t even a real problem and that public data about COVID19 sicknesses and deaths are probably all lies...while at the same time asserting that it’s good for people to get sick, because it’s building up “natural immunity” and helping weed undesirable genes out of the population. “COVID19 isn’t real” and “COVID19 is a great and good thing for human eugenics” are contradictory propositions, but to the dedicated rationalizer, there’s no contradiction at all—instead they see the conflicting rationalizations as “covering all their bases”. either the disease is a liberal fake, or it’s a purgative force for good: it’s like a win-win!

I’m not sure how to repair this situation. from my perspective it’s like the Western mind has dissolved into grey goo; our champions of “reason” are blithering dunces whose talk is almost entirely memetic, and they’re too well practiced in ducking all attempts at refutation. online, anyway, they usually run away from challenge; sometimes one of the ideologues gets humiliated in a public venue (like when Zizek flayed Jordan Peterson) but this scarcely slows them down. they simply pretend like the humiliation never happened, and keep on saying the same things they always say. what do we do, in such a dismal situation? surely logic and reason, those mighty abstractions, have not simply lost their substance, even if “the West” doesn’t seem to know how they work anymore.

~Chara of Pnictogen

[reflectionsofgalaxies]

Introduction time! Gonna be a huge photo dump for the first intro, but after this I’ll only be posting photos when there are visible changes or updates to my plants 🪴

To start off these are two lovely succulents I impulse bought from the grocery store, because the poor delosperma (left) had been left out in torrential rain with soil that had almost no drainage, and the sempervivum (right, also called hen and chicks) had FIVE chicks all crowded in there and again really damp soil with poor drainage, so I separated the four largest chicks but am leaving the smallest one with mom for a little longer. The day after I got the delosperma into more appropriate soil it started to bloom for me!

Next we have a very leggy boi, my hemp plant (left), grown from a seed I found in with the hemp mix I put on my cereal! I can’t really use him for anything but he’s so tall and loves to climb so I just think he’s lovely to look at. In the middle we have my seedling experiment tray, I literally just throw seeds/plants in here to see if they’ll sprout or root and some do! I’ve got four mystery sunflower seedlings curtesy of my bird seed mix, a baby fern with a tiny bit of root rescued from someone’s garden clippings, and a spinach plant that I didn’t have room for and wasn’t doing great, so I just plopped him in here and mist him occasionally and he seems to like it? He’s grown since I moved him away from the other sprouts. And finally my random prop tray! Some of these I’m like 99.9% sure won’t propagate, but no harm in waiting to see. Includes broken leaves from re-potting, fallen leaves from grocery store succulents, and some leaf cuttings from a friend’s plant collection!

These are my Russian Mammoth sunflowers on the left (I had them in too low light to start so they got very tall poor things, but I moved them into better light and now they’re putting their energy into pushing out their true leaves.) And beside them on the right are dollar store flower seedlings that I promptly threw out the package for and now have no recollection of what they actually are. Oops.

My little kitchen table-top garden with my spider plant (front left) who is in a pot that I know is a little cramped for her but I just love love love it, and it’s from a local woman owned company. Behind her I have my two very scraggly poinsettias from Christmas’s past, I don’t like tossing plants so I’ve just kept these guys barely alive and chilling on my kitchen table for three (left) and two years (right). In the right photo we have some spinach sprouts, a tiny African violet that split off from its mother plant (almost killed her too, they were so root bound, which is something African violets usually tolerate decently well.) In the heart we have my beloved young black prince echeveria (this was a dollar store container my mom was going to toss, instead I stabbed some drainage holes in the bottom and I think it’s a super cute pot, I’m going to do more with it at some point.) In the very middle in the jar lid are some cacti pups that one of my bedroom plants pushed out. These things are insane, they propagate like nothing I’ve seen before and are honestly impossible to kill in my experience. They were a gift from a neighbour and I have no clue what they actually are, so if someone knows please enlighten me, I’ve had them for years now and know nothing. In the very front of course is my seed starters, can’t remember what I planted where tbh but I woke up this morning to the first two tiny sprouts!

I’m about to hit the image limit so I’m going to introduce my last two in a separate post.