More plant stuff.

[kiya]

Meet Steve. I really don't know why this iris is named Steve, but I want to get me some Steve and plant it somewhere.

Posted here because I was discussing Steve with autumnesquirrel last night, and also because if I put a link to Steve somewhere I'll be able to find it later without finding oneironaut and asking pathetically, "Where's Steve again?"

Isn't Steve pretty?

(I have now lost 'Steve'. Steve, Stevestevesteve. It's not really a word, is it?)

Comments

Hee

[leback.livejournal.com]

The fern that Alexei and I have not yet acquired is named Steve. I've never been clear on the reason.

Steve, meet Steve.

Re: Hee

[kiya]

I had a couple of friends in high school who would name things. Fook named things "Joe", and Lunq named things "Steve".

They got very competetive about it.

So random things named Steve are things that I'm trained to just take in stride.

But "I'm gonna plant me some Steve!" is such a tremendously delightful sentence.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

"Hi, I'm Steve, and I'll be your iris tonight."

[briar24.livejournal.com]

You get the pickup-line-of-the-week award, hands down.
And an extra 3 points for your icon photo.
:-)

[keeps.livejournal.com]

Ooh. I want Steve.

[pameladean]

I see that Wayside Gardens has smitten you.

Be careful. After resisting their blandishments for years, I suddenly ordered three rosebushes. I am now waiting to see if they have survived their first Minnesota winter.

WG's hardiness information is sometimes a bit optimistic.

And yes, Steve is divinely beautiful. I expect they just ran out of other names for irises, or else decided that in a genus called largely things like "Butter and Sugar" or "Irene," they wanted something manly. Cause it's blue, you know.

Pamela

[kiya]

The Wayside Gardens thing is all oneironaut's fault. He's a wicked temptress, I tell you.

Well, of course, blue would make for a terrifically butch iris. Hee hee hee.

[pameladean]

*choke*

They're on safe ground there. Absent the iris borer, almost all irises are butch.

Pamela

[oneironaut.livejournal.com]

I was disappointed by Wayside Gardens' website, but I grew up on their paper catalog and still consider it recreational reading. We had some really amazing gardening going at our last house, including one of my favorite plants ever, a Joseph's coat rosebush that cheerfully overgrew half the deck and bloomed for ages in half a dozen colors; that bush was entirely Wayside Gardens' fault.

And yes, Steve is divinely beautiful. I expect they just ran out of other names for irises, or else decided that in a genus called largely things like "Butter and Sugar" or "Irene," they wanted something manly. Cause it's blue, you know.

And 'Isidore' wasn't good enough? ;)

[oneironaut.livejournal.com]

And 'Isidore' wasn't good enough? ;)

I just realized what an incredibly stupid thing I said -- gift of Isis, not gift of Iris, and furthermore duh.

And it was so amusing until I realized I had my letters switched around. Woe.

[pameladean]

White Flower Farms' website almost outstrips their catalog. Almost. I agree that Wayside's is but a pale shadow. And yes. I keep them and reread them. I think it was Susan Sontag who once, when asked what her favorite book was, asked if she could say "The White Flower Farm" catalog. This is essentially perverse, but still, I sometimes see the point. WG's prose is different but so evocative.

Pamela

[briar24.livejournal.com]

I particularly liked this line, "Maintenance-free, Steve reappears reliably every late spring to early summer in the sunny garden!"

I think... I want to marry Steve.
Steve sounds rather solid, yet, festive.

[kiya]

Steve does sound like good relationship material, now that you mention it. :>

Re:

[briar24.livejournal.com]

Though, with my history of depression, I don't know that I'd want to marry a Steve who was quite so blue.
:)

[larksdream]

Tough AND carefree... I like that in a Steve...

[redbird]

Steve is gorgeous.

If I had a plausible sunny patch, I'd give him a home.

[qarylla.livejournal.com]

Oooh plants!

I name all of my plants. I don't always remember the names later, but I try.

I used to have a bamboo named Shinji... it died.

Now I have a bamboo named Louis, a mostly dead pine named Fred, an Ivy named Fern (umm, yeah), a Habanero (which is really, really happy) named Mike (though most of the time I don't bother with the name), four tiny cactus of the apocalypse, and a jade and aloe who are ninja and don't bother with stupid little names (I think).

Whoa. I guess I have a few more living plants than I thought.

[frozencapybara.livejournal.com]

I used to have a bamboo named Shinji... it died.

I had a Swedish Ivy named Shinji. I kept it alive for about a year and a half. Most of the time it was all wilty, sad, and pathetic, and barely alive. Then, one day, for no reason I could determine, it apparently said to itself: "Wait! Life IS worth living after all! I'm happy! I'm going to GROW!" And it did. For about a week. Then it sunk back into its former sad, pathetic state. And then it died.
Shinji really was the appropriate name for it.