.bob.

.apparently april got away from me.

i was meaning to blog, really. but i had a conference in dc, then i was in seattle for a long weekend, and before i knew it, april is now almost gone. whaa?

spring is sort of starting to emerge here in boston. lilacs are slowly opening up, tulips are emerging from hibernation. we had a week of 70 degree weather, but now it's rainy and coolish again. my allergies are going wild. regular springtime in new england.

today, i want to talk about my brief love affair with bob.

who is bob, you might ask? no, j and i did not break up. rather, bob is my orchid. was?

let's start from the beginning.

for some reason, for the longest time i have had an aversion to orchids. i don't think this was actually based on anything - i just thought they were sort of a generic flower that everyone got excited about. then, went to the isabella stewart gardner museum with c a while back, and discovered that orchids are awesome.

there is a gorgeous enclosed courtyard in the middle of the museum (it is in an old house) with beautiful ferns, and moss, and orchids. lots and lots of orchids. hundreds of orchids, thousands of orchids, millions and billions and trillions of orchids (am i the only person who has read this book?) okay, maybe that's an exaggeration, but it seemed like it.

there were orchids peeking out from behind foliage everywhere you turned. teensy orchids. massive orchids. white, magenta, green, yellow. all different colors. it was really cool. i liked the garden more than i liked the actual museum (the museum was still pretty cool). the only con was that you can't actually walk in the garden, you just have to admire from the fringes.

anyway, i was inspired to go buy an orchid, so i went to the florist i've been to before in harvard square, and started asking the guy that works there about orchids.
me: are orchids difficult to care for? i don't get much lightguy: oh, orchids are the easiest plant to care for! they don't need a lot of light. in fact, they should only have dappled sunshine.

done.


so i bought an awesome orchid with a big yellow and pink flower, and several other buds, brought it home, replanted it, and named it bob. yes, i realize that i am incredibly bizarre in naming my plants. whatever, i don't have a pet. deal with it.

so i watered it just like the literature said i should, and put it in dappled sunshine just like all of the literature said i should. and watched as one by one, bob's beautiful flowers shriveled and died.

what the heck. can i not keep a living thing alive?? this distresses me, particularly because i want to have a massive garden when i actually have a house.

.i just love bob's little pronged beards.

let me clarify that the actual plant part of bob is fine - very green, beautiful. alive. but the blooms all died.

so now i'm thinking that i have to simply resort to succulents. those are impossible to kill, right??

.cheers.