Cactus and Other Things

Greetings Earthlings!  We seem to have overcome most of the plague that entered the house.  There is some residual fatigue, but that's getting better.  There has been a ride and a hike, neither caused a relapse.  Jim's level of mucous is much decreased and I am feeling better.  So, there is hope that we will survive this.  

I have photos which I like.  This was taken in 2023 at Dove Mountain during the winter of staying in AirBnBs.  I found it the other day looking for photos suitable for printing on canvas.  The cactus are nicely grouped there.

We had rain, which cleared up, and then cloudy skies.  We went for a hike which was delightful.  I took the top photo, Jim took the bottom one, standing slightly to the left of me.  His light was better than mine.  When we lived in the house on Ten Star we could see this mountain from the front door.  I miss seeing that, but I do not miss the giant wall of windows and sliding glass doors that were facing towards the setting sun.  It was too hot.  This house has no view, but it's much more tolerable in summer since the westward facing window is small, and there are deep overhangs front and back.

 
This was the sky coming back from the grocery store.  It was fairly cloudy all day. 

The yard guys are coming back tomorrow with some more rock and they are going to dig up the agave.  It's too close to the golden barrel cactus, and it's too enthusiastic of a pupper.  Agaves, if not constrained, will become ground cover. Apparently this batch are deliriously happy.  Note the little green off shoots that are barely out of the ground.  Look down and slightly left.  Those are pups.  They grow on runners and are many.

So, the agaves go so that the barrels can prosper.  I hate to do it.  However, we have more agaves in the yard.

This is our neighbor's driveway.  His agave has put out two pups, one of which tunneled under his driveway and emerged in the crack between the garage floor and the driveway.

This is a mammilaria growing in a neighbor's yard.  This plant is just perfect.

He's putting out adorable little flowers.

In other news:

There has been a peace negotiation at Mar-a-Lago.  Oddly enough, Putin was not there.  The US side is still insisting Ukraine should give up land, and Ukraine is refusing.  The US seems to be offering security guarantees.  I hope no one falls for that.  In 1994 Ukraine gave up their nukes in exchange for security guarantees from the UK, US and Russia.  We can see how well that worked out.  We are a terrible ally.  

This was on twitter recently.  Another fine decision has been made by this administration. "Further proving his incompetence, Kash Patel said the FBI is moving to the Reagan Building at Federal Triangle in D.C. Instead of a state of the art facility which would provide security they will retrofit a building not built for that purpose 3 blocks from current headquarters."  I think 47 wants to build a hotel on the site of the current FBI building.

AI continues to be the gift that keeps on giving.  NPR reported that the price of computer memory is going to be through the roof due to demand from AI data centers. If you're considering a new lap top, now might be a good time to buy it.  More from Mashable here.

And finally there is this.

The chlorinated chicken comes from the US.  The UK and the EU don't want it.