Skyfiery Shadowolf

Just started on season 5 of Doctor Who, and I like it a lot already.

Also watched "Blink" of season 3, the one where the Weeping Angels first appeared. I have to say they're scary and disturbing.

A good new series to watch for me.

Okay, I need something to cheer me up, so here are two things today which did:


Kalanchoe tomentosa (aka panda plant) plants I bought. My dad killed my first one quite a few years ago, and because I'd chanced upon these being sold in thumb pots for $2.80 each, I decided to get two.



I saw a baby gecko crawling across my living room floor, and quickly caught it because I didn't want my dad to see it and kill it. (A few years ago, an adult gecko somehow found its way into our washing machine's motherboard and fried itself there. The machine cost $300 to repair and my dad has been setting lizard traps out ever since, or killing lizards. So I've been saving them and placing them in my garden)

My friend and I have nicknamed this gecko "Charmander". Heh.

I don't watch TV almost at all, so it's only now that I got to know this short film exists.

"Ah Kong" means "grandfather" in Mandarin/Hokkien.

(Subtitles in English)

The parentals bought THREE huge cartons of mandarin oranges for Chinese New Year this year. Now we have too many and they're trying to make me eat more of them, or take the oranges to the office for others to eat.

I decided to just peel four of them to make some fruit enzyme (which concentrates the good stuff so that apparently, the health benefits are a lot more or a lot more concentrated).

The MOST important thing to note when making fruit enzyme is that the fruits must be absolutely dried. If not, mold will grow.

I don't have a dehydrator (and frankly, I prefer not to use one because it uses electricity), so I just laid all the slices out on flat places and covered the plates with a food cover.

Since I did it last night and only filled the jar up this afternoon, they've been air-dried for about 13 hours.

Dry enough, I hope.

Shall let everything infuse for about a month or so (assuming mold doesn't form THIS time), and then start taking the honey with my water kefir (and possibly feed the orange slices to my worms).

I'm tempted to start another jar with another combination of fruits and veggies, but meh...I might not be able to finish eating it so fast anyway.

( Fruit enzyme in the making )

So, I went to the World Orchid Conference today. The weekday ticket is originally $15, but since I managed to grab the Groupon offer, it was $7.50. Thank goodness for that, because I absolutely hated the orchid exhibits. Okay, it's probably because I think the orchid species as a whole produces very gaudy flowers which I don't like. So...

I only walked around the exhibits (obligatory walk, since I did pay for the tickets) for barely 10 minutes before I went off to spend almost two hours at the marketplace *coughs coughs*.

About 80% of the stalls there sell orchids (well, this IS the World Orchid Conference). I kind of bypassed many of the stalls, only lingering at those which sold jewel orchids, and also asking around for any stalls which sold vanilla orchids (because the idiot who I am wants to try to grow them meters long to flowering stages, take the trouble to hand-pollinate the flowers to try to grow seed pods, and THEN harvest/dry/cure the seed pods for use. All because I find it fun. Heh)

My original budget was $50. And, I SWEAR! (lol) that even with three jewel orchids which cost me $24 in total, and an extremely long variegated vanilla orchid cutting which cost me $20, I was within my budget.

And then I made the mistake of visiting Terrascapes, a store opened by a gardening acquaintance. The moment I saw the N. ampullaria (burgandy?) he was selling, my budget went poof! So...from having spent only $46, my total expenditure went up to $121. >.< But it's worth it. :P

( Piccies of plant-haul today )

I should probably update my gardening blog with these, too. LOL.

Sighs. I'm probably not gonna be able to sleep well until I get the stitches of the minor surgery done on my wisdom tooth out.

It's strange that three of my wisdom teeth SUDDENLY decided to give me a lot of problems since this April. I went to extract my upper left in April; extracted my upper right in September; and had the surgery for my lower right only this Sunday past. All of them had suddenly caused the gums surrounding them to be infected and swollen, even though three of four have already grown out and stabilized themselves.

This current one which is healing had an impacted tooth. Thankfully, the tooth didn't have to be smashed into pieces, and came out in one whole piece.

Maybe I've been eating too large a meal for these few days, because I take like an hour to finish a plate of rice, and the constant chewing motion might have caused the swelling to become worse. Again.

Have taken my antibiotics, painkillers etc. Hoping the wound will heal come this Sunday, when I go to take the stitches out.

Irritating.

Okay, so...two months ago, I invested $3,500 in vacuum system with German technology. My dad paid for his own system and mine using his credit card, and I reinburse him every month.

What happened was this: my family was strolling around having after dinner at a mall near our place, when a person from a roadshow there approached my mom and sis, offering a free, good quality stainless steel pot which costs about $100+, in exchange for a free demonstration of their vacuum system at a set date at our house.

So my dad thought: why not?

The person came.

In all respects, the system functions like any other cleaner in the market which cost a few hundred dollars. But there were many other functions which were specific to it, and which impressed us so much we were convinced, even though on-the-spot Googling about it brought up bad reviews of customer service from the company. So far, though, we've been very happy with this purchase/s.

The one which sold us on the product the most was the cleaning head for beds and pillows. It was the first I'd seen anywhere, and the rotating brush actually causes intense vibrations in order to bring to the surface all the bed mites, dead skins and etc. which are hidden deep within the bed itself. We also made the person do a test showing the difference between the amount of junk vacuumed with the vibrations, and without. The result was astounding, and scary.

Gonna let the pictures do the talking.

( Gross pictures of what comes out of my bed during my fortnightly or monthly vacuuming )

I still gag every single time I vacuum my bed and see the scum which comes up. It's absolutely gross.

The first time the lady demonstrated on my mattress, which I've had for 14 years because it cost a few hundred dollars and is still usable, and is from a very good brand (Seahorse), I gagged. You mean I've been sleeping on those things every night for 14 years? Oh man.

So, anyway, the machine allows us to purify the air (sucks air in, passes it through the water, and then purges clean air out from around the machine), clean aircon pipes which are linked from the aircon to the drains, vacuum dirt from soft toys etc., vacuum the floor/carpets etc., vacuum TV screens and all those without causing scratches, and some other functions which I can't remember for now.

You know, just the sight off the scum reminds me of why this is such an expensive, but good investment.

Ugh.

The hoya lacunosa half-rooted cutting which HL gave me in March just sent out an umbel of flowers, and they just bloomed today.

I like them better than the obscura flowers, I think. :)

I was trying to photograph a spider in my garden today, when the/a baby gecko living in my garden (have seen it a few times) caught my eyes instead.


The gecko snuck out of the mouth of my dad's bonsai figure thingy.

My hoya multiflora has FINALLY bloomed ever since it started aborting unopened flowers for some weeks.

Finally!

The tiny purple markings look very pretty amidst the cream-white of the petals.