#They are perennial outdoors here if you dig up and store the rhizomes over winter

[thaylepo]

hubris

I've been super into repotting all my propogating houseplants and growing seeds from grocery store fruit for shits and giggles this summer.

Pictured are my many lil jade plant babies, my red currant tree that has survived and regrown from someone (not me) putting it into a storage unit for winter while it was still green and leafing (pro tip: make sure ppl caring for your potted trees while you are off in a different town for college know not to heckin do that), and my lil baby dragonfruit cacti in their Humidity Bins because it is dry as a popcorn fart where I live.

(Another pro tip: don't forget to open the bins, as pictured properly here, when placing them outside in the morning sun for some good good UV -- this avoids literally steam-cooking your poor innocent baby cacti. That one's on me. I won't show you a pic of the resulting carnage, but suffice to say about half survived. Luckily dragonfruit seeds are super easy to germinate like this and can be bought in the literal thousands for the low low price of 7.99 per a single fruit at safeway.)

But by far the most consequential of this summer's fucking around and finding out is this:

Context: So the downstairs bathroom where I live has a dried flower arrangement in it (i live with a lady in her 60s, it is her house). Said flower arrangement includes these:

(apologies to anyone with trypophobia.)

These are lotus seed pods, for those who do nor know. Large ones. These ones are only a bit smaller than the palm of my hand, and they come from this flower:

(Unsourced pinterest photo with live human being for scale. Note the corresponding palm-sized seed pods.)

Five days ago I found one of the seeds from these pods on the bathroom floor, idly looked up some how-to instructions, and I think you have all you need to put the rest of this story together.

After only two days in water, I was forced to confront what I, primarily a succulant and cactus grower, might have gotten myself into.

Some people are born great, some acheive greatness, and others fuck around with seeds from a tropical water plant that have been known to still germinate after 200 years without thinking of what exactly they'll do if it actually grows, and find themselves unprepared for the responsibility of what will become the water-garden version of Jack's fucking beanstalk.

I'm naming it Audrey II. Updates will follow.