Friday, January 20, 2023

Name that Palm!

Hello, Darlings

Today I am sharing with you a part of an encounter with an elderly male, who may or may not be as old as I am. These days with the exception of my husband, most of the men I encounter are younger than myself. Nevertheless, as I was riding home on the bus, the above man asked me the name of the palm tree I had just bought.

Being a jovial mode and with a little thought (very little), I responded, Jeff. This went on until I had mentioned the names of several of my other plants. I mentioned my Fred the “Indian Laurel”, a ficus tree, George, a Weeping Widow tree also a ficus tree, and one other. But I didn’t name Thelma, a snake plant or, that one of my cats name is Sam.

As I was leaving the bus I noticed that a few of other passengers on the bus were smiling with little twinkles in their eyes. This was a good day.

Well, it wasn’t until early today that I realized that that man was asking me the botanical name of my palm tree, and if I hadn’t been in such a playful mode, would have stated in all truth that I never keep the botanical names of any plants in my head.  I only keep what I believe is useful and necessary up there. I know the common names of the plants and that is good enough for me. However, the botanical names of all my plants both indoors and outdoors are written in my indoor and outdoor gardening journals. I have kept journals for years, and I keep them update to date on my success, failures and of the pests affecting them; the flying, the crawling, the four legged and the worse -- the two legged. The latter is the cause of most failures since moving into this house. Nevertheless, my gardens are one of my favorite pastimes since my retirement, and I am not pleased at all when someone destroys one of them.

However, and back on a good note, the botanical names of plants are not important to me. Over the decades, I have learned enough about indoor and outdoor plants from their basic knowledge, characteristics and care that makes them the perfect choice for me to add it to my two gardens.

Below are photos of some my indoor plants to which all of them are growing well under plant lights with little or no natural sunlight. When it isn’t cold and drafty the added sunlight is a plus to their growth. Click pictures to enlarge

Sago Palm - Cycas revoluta surrounded by Super Blue Liriope -  Liriope muscari, Chinese evergreen - Aglaonema, Bromeliad - Bromelioidea, Anthurium - Anthurium spp. Araceae, Spider Plant - Chlorophytum comosum,  Calla Lily - Zantedeschia & others
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Easter cactus - Rhipsalideae gaertneri



Sansevieria Trifasciata - Mother-in-Law's Tongue Plant - Snake Plant

Spearpoint Ivy - Hedera helix

Weeping Widow - Ficus tree

Pygmy Date Palm - Phoenix Roebelen

Cat Palm - Cataractarum Palm, ZZ plant - Zamioculcas zamiifolia Raven. Bromeliad - Bromelioideae, Little Bing - Cherry Tomato Plant  & others

As you can see from their botanical names they are a mouth full that I don’t have any interest in learning. Give me the everyday common names. As stated above, they are all living without natural sunlight at present.

 Until next time,

     Chow, Darlings

P.S. Among the recent classic movies I have watched is the 1956 “Please Murder Me”. In it a scheming widow used several men to her bidding and for personal gain. This film is an AFI favorite and should be viewed only for enjoyment and study of the entertainment arts. 

Tuesday, January 3, 2023

Experiencing Windows 11 Woes? Want Widows 10 back?

Were you like me? Did you jump on the free Windows 11 operating system  upgrade bandwagon from Windows 10, which was working perfectly well at the time, only to discover a world of configuration problems, missing apps, as well as a new look that eradicated all the perfect and fine tuned and useful tools on the file explorer navigation bar? 

To make matters worse you failed to read the fine print that stated that you had only ten days to try Windows 11 before it became irreversible.

Six months later. Are your tears still falling? Stop pulling at your weave! And for god sake, don’t sling your pc or laptop out the nearest window. Help is here!!!!

For months there was no solution to reversing windows 11 back to widows 10. In all truth, I disliked Windows 11 appearance. The taskbar, start window and file explorer were changed. All things that made working with windows easy were either moved or removed all together.

After months of trying programs and codes that promised to restore or replace the Windows 10 appearance for use within Windows 11, which only ended with minimum results that did nothing, but ghost themselves on top of Windows 11 and only added to the display confusion, I had had enough and thankfully Microsoft came out with a solution.

The solution is to reinstall the entire Windows 10 operating system by downgrading from Windows 11 for all times.

Therefore, for those of you who were like me and were too quick in downloading and installing Windows 11 here are links for returning Windows 10 to your beloved pc. 

Follow the direction on the Microsoft’s Create Media Creation Tool for Windows 10. However, it is also a very good idea to first watch and re-watch if necessary the two videos below that show just what steps to expect when reinstalling Windows 10.

Step 1 being, backup all your personal files and programs that you purchased.


 

Until next time,

     Chow, Darlings

P.S.   In case there arise some questioning about the legality and licensing of this downgrade, I assure you that it is all legal and provided from Microsoft for those wishing to return to their licensed Windows 10 operating system.

In short it’s FREE!