GPE #4 : Dinahmow's Down Under Jungle

Welcome to the fourth garden of the

10th Anniversary  I N F O M A N I A C  Garden Photos Event 

 We have journeyed to the southern hemisphere to take in the exotic delights of Dinahmow's garden on the east coast of Queensland, Australia where Dinah can often be found "wafting about the yard in my Morrissy Florrissy gown.  Maybe in a sun bonnet with a cute little trug on my arm."*

 First on the agenda is Dinah's triffid, followed by a rant about bananas(?!), and then some choice specimens from her subtropical surroundings...

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 You're welcome to use this, rusty chains an' all, in your triffid collection. I'll try for a photo showing the miniscule flowers. 

[IDV - I happened to mention that the little/normal leaves made me think it was some type of Hoya, and this is what Dinahmow came back with:] 

 Hoya-arghh! Bloody ants! I did have a Hoya, but ants totally wrecked it. I think there may have been one flower... 

 You do know they will NOT flower unless pot-bound? That said, mine should have romped away, but the ants were sheer hell. And I do not spray nasties so... 

 Now, about the Dischidia...I did snap a pic of the flowers; not easy with the wind going bananas on the Beaufort scale. Oh! Bananas... that's another thing! I may come back to England ... where bananas are not a problem! The ones we have in this garden are commonly known as "lady fingers" and I'm not sure why; I'd say they are more like short, fat, man fingers. Anyway, this is the only variety allowed for back yard gardens. The Cavendish, grown commercially, is far superior. But the Man actually LIKES these horrid things! Fine, he can eat them with his breakfast fruit. But any banana plant is horror in a small yard.

 Here's the teeny weeny flower approx .5cm of the Dischidia pectinoides. You can see some of the seed pods (My chap calls them turtle shells) beginning to form.

[Clockwise from top left:] 

1. Dischidia pectinoides  

2. Dwarf heliconia (crab claw) 

3. Tacca (bat plant) 

4. Zyzgium wilsonii - renamed by Jon "Drag Queen"  

GPE #3 : Pam Demic Gets A Prick (or several...)

Welcome to the third garden of the

10th Anniversary  I N F O M A N I A C  Garden Photos Event 

 Maddie, the Mistress Borghese - and her alter ego, Pam Demic - have stepped up with a wonderful floral display for this, the third of 2020's Garden Photo Event installments.  I'll just hand you over to her now... 

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First off, for the tour and in a time of COVID-19 I didn't know if I should come veiled and gloved.  I don't go anywhere these days without my veil.

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Since I have but a little pied-à-terre, with no outside garden, I sent some beauties from my aunt's garden, with her glorious roses. I'm not sure the variety, but I do know when helping her prune, I have gotten pricked numerous times, and I'm not one to complain over a small prick, but these are wickedly prickly.... but, oh so bushy, fragrant and full. Here in October, they are still going strong with tons of bloom.

GPE #2 : Exploring Jon's Back Passage

Welcome to the second garden of the

10th Anniversary  I N F O M A N I A C  Garden Photos Event 

 Today we find ourselves in the delightful surroundings of the Extensive Grounds of Delores Delargo Towers in North London, as attended to by Jon and Madam Arcati.  So, without further ado, I'll hand you over to Jon so he can guide you through his lush and verdant back passage...  Remember to click the pics to engorge!

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Spring came quite early to the extensive gardens here at Dolores Delargo Towers this year and was awash with colour, given the mild winter and the lovely sunny spells that greeted the beginning of lockdown - and at least being at home every day meant we could enjoy it! Crocus, hyacinths, cyclamen, anemones, chionodoxa, dwarf iris, ipheon, fritillaria, snowdrops, (and later) tulips, aquilegia and bluebells all thrived beautifully.

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The Very Mistress's 10th Annual Lady Garden Presentation*

Oops!  I mean:

is now open!

 First, a little history of this auspicious event: Back in 2011, everyone's favourite Lazy Baggage (thank you, Beast), The Very Mistress (then known as MJ), decided that she couldn't be bothered to make any further effort on her blog, and swanned off to Montreal to get away from it all.  Just before she left, she tasked her Infomaniac Bitches to send in photos of their gardens or other greenery that she could display upon her return, probably thinking that there'd be two or three photos that she could just paste into a blog post, add a couple of captions, and publish while she collapsed with a Jameson's or twelve.  

Little did she know how popular this would be, however, and returned to garden photos from 21 of her faithful Bitches.  With what I imagine to be an enormous sigh, an over-dramatic eyeroll, and no small amount of swearing/drinking, The Very Mistress got to work collating the photos and organising them into a tasteful (ahem) display for her Bitches' voyeuristic enjoyment, and the first Infomaniac Garden Photos Event was born!

 With the event a resounding success, The Very Mistress brought it back the next year, and the year after that, and every following year.  And now, ten years later and true to form, the Lazy Baggage The Very Mistress gracefully demured from hosting the Garden Photos Event herself and palmed it off bestowed it with great honour upon her throng of gullible suckers attendant Bitches.  

 Which is why, in this tenth anniversary year, you find the Infomaniac Garden Photos Event being held here at Inexplicable DeVice rather than at Infomaniac.

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Terrifying Triffidery: An Infomaniac Garden Photos Event attraction

Yes, it's time for some Terrifying Triffidery!

 

 Welcome to the show!  I hope you weren't blinded by the sun in the previous post otherwise these Triffids will find you easy prey.  I advise observing the triffids in groups of two or three - do not go it alone - and keep well back (you should all be used to social distancing by now, anyway).

 If you make it out alive, I wonder if you can guess the real world plants that these monstrous specimens sprang from?  And which of you lovely Blogorati sent them in?  Please note (and I must channel The Very Mistress here): "The Management reminds you that the Garden Photos Event is NOT a contest", so I shan't be keeping score, and there shall be no points or prizes - this is just for a bit of fun. 

 The plants and their keepers will be revealed in the main event in a couple of days time.

 

 As with one or two things in life, giving the images a poke or prod will see them engorge in size (well, most of them, anyway...).  Don't poke them too much, mind - you're liable to lose your arm!

First up, this truly terrifying Triffid

(which was so scary that I used it for the header image):

Crack of Dawn

 Since the clocks were put back, I have found myself up just before the crack of dawn - a horrifying experience some might say (and I'm sure dawn wasn't too thrilled, either...) - but the last four days have yielded some fine early morning images. (Not this morning though, as it's my day off, so I languished in bed until nearly 7:00am!)

 

 So, before we dive headlong into the 10th Anniversary  I N F O M A N I A C  Garden Photos Event - which starts on Saturday 31st with the Terrifying Triffidery preview attraction - the Host thought he'd dump this load of early morning photographs for you to peruse and note how similar many of them are despite having whittled them down enormously to much wailing and gnashing of teeth (he finds making these sorts of unimportant-in-the-grand-scheme-of-things decisions rather fraught).

 Shut up.  Let's get on with it then, shall we?

First up is a small, rather dull selection from Sunday 25th starting with a zoomed-in shot of the groynes at Trimingham

Another zoomed shot (although, less so) of Overstrand's groynes, including the End-of-the-Line and Sidestrand beyond (Trimingham on the horizon)

Infomaniac Garden Photos Event - Final Reminder

Last orders for:

 

 Terrifying Triffidery*, a House of  INFOMANIAC  Garden Photos Event Attraction, is opening on Saturday 31st October, so if you'd like a particular beastly botanical or array of ghastly greenery to be featured, please submit your photo/s to me by Wednesday night, 28th October (my email address is in my Blogger Profile - just click on the right there in my Sideboard).

 For those of you who are still dilly-dallying over your non-scary submissions for the Garden Photos Event proper, you have an extra few days from the 28th to email them in (as I already have a handful of entries that will cover the first week or so of November).  If you need any extra time, let me know in the comments and I'll see if I can juggle things around to fit your garden photos in towards the end of the event.

* The Terrifying Triffidery Exhibit will be a place to show off your horticultural horrors or otherwise ordinary plants that have been photographed from odd angles/close up/while drunk which make them look out of this world. So, get inventive/within-2-metres/drinking and get that camera out!

 

Drunken Shags with Wonky Groynes

 It's that time of year again...

 Many happy returns to Dinahmow today! And to Mistress Maddie and Rimpy* on Sunday!

 Oh, and what else?  Ah, yes, apart from being Hallowe'en, the 31st is also the beginning of the House of Infomaniac's 10th Anniversary Garden Photos Event!  And, remember, this prestigious event is being held here rather than at The Very Mistress's this year, so you'll need to email your green-fingered photos - including any Terrifying Triffidery you may have happened to snap - to me (email address in my Blogger Profile) by Wednesday 28th October.  Mark it on your calendars!

* Sorry Rimpy, the calendar had already been printed by the time I discovered that you had an October birthday, too.

Glass Starships

 Ms Scarlet made an island with hers. I made glass starships:

 

 

There. 

P.S. It took me ten months to gather up enough sea glass to make these since sending the previous collection to Ms Scarlet.  (There are a few more bigger, more wonky bits just out of shot...)

Lurkers

 The last couple of days have seen some unusual suspects lurking on the cusp of Hexenhäusli Device's sphere of influence.*  There have also been some entirely usual suspects but, before we get to them, the first of the unusual: a buzzard!

 

 Buzzards are a regular occurance around here, but they're usually found circling high above with only their tell-tale cry a giveaway that they're about.  They roost in some of the tall trees behind Hexenhäusli Device, but this one looks like it stopped for a rest in the sycamore tree overhanging the garden, which is very unusual.

 

"I don't think that's a tower full of cows..."

 After the Garden Photos Event announcement and various Star Trek-related scribbles, sketches, and photo-comics, I thought it was time to get back to a post full of photographs.  And, unlike many photos displayed here over the past few years, you may be surprised to discover that some of them are of subject matter never before seen on this blog!

 First of the unseen-til-now is the lake at Felbrigg.  I was dragged across fields and countryside by my sister, Inexcuseable, her husband, and Count Podgkinson (although he spent quite a lot of time in his pushchair... lucky sod), on a boiling hot day back in mid-September.  It was all right, I suppose...

There were cormorants!

Art Trek miscellanea

 Hello! Did you know, it's been nearly two months since I put up a Star Trek-related post?  Well, it has. So, I'm going to remedy that with this selection of Star Trek art.  

 Don't worry, it won't take long. 

 

 Oh, pay no heed to Lying Cat.  She's like a broken record.  Always spouting off that tired catchphrase.  Anyone would think it's the only word she can say...

 Anyway, there is a point to Saga's Lying Cat featuring here - it's that she was the inspiration for the following two photomontage comic-style dalliances starring Deanna Troi.  For those who don't know, Troi is the telepathic/empathic counsellor and diplomatic officer aboard the Enterprise-D in Star Trek: The Next Generation (and my favourite character in that show), and could also tell when someone was lying (mostly).

Here she is with Doctor Beverly Crusher in the Enterprise's hair & beauty salon:

And here she is again assisting Captain Picard in the downfall of regular Romulan antagonist Tomalak: