Wyst: Alastor 1716: Very Good
In the late morning I finished Wyst: Alastor 1716, Alastor book 2 of 3 by Jack Vance. I liked the rereading of this story more than I expected, especially the second half. In short: very good.
Marune: Alastor 933
From his fabulous palace on Numenes, the Connatic rules the sprawling Alastor Cluster, and tracks the doings of each of his trillion or more subjects. But there is one man he knows nothing about; the past life of the wanderer called Pardero is a complete mystery. Pardero himself has two goals: first, to find out who he is, then to find his enemy- the person who stole his memory. He discovers that his home is the mysterious Marune , a planet lit by four shifting suns, and Pardero makes his way there- to be hailed as the Kaiark Efraim, ruler of the shadowed realm. Uncovering his lost identity had been comparatively simple, but finding his sworn enemy would be more difficult...
In the afternoon I started in Marune: Alastor 933, Alastor book 3 of 3 by Jack Vance. I downloaded the version with cover art by Konstantin Korobov.
Many years ago I named one of my Silicon Graphics Indy workstations, which I had bought second hand, after the planet in this story: Marune.
Mounting a Brassavola nodosa orchid
Last Friday I had ordered some dried sphagnum moss. I wanted to mount a Brassavola nodosa, originally a present for my mother, on a piece of cork. I was expecting the moss to arrive last Saturday, so that day I removed the orchid from its pot, removed the dead roots, moss, bark, and cleaned the healthy roots carefully.
Next, I carved a small piece out of a cork tube to make space for the orchid. By mounting it on a cork tube and giving it more light I hope to finally get flowers. It hasn't done so in nearly seven years!
And today the sphagnum moss arrived. It was dried and compressed in a flat package. I let it soak for a while in warm water.
I used 3 pieces of plant twist tie to hold the orchid in place with the sphagnum moss underneath its roots. Hopefully, with better care, the orchid is going to flower soon. In my experience, a different plant and in Mexico, the flowers of the Brassavola nodosa smell very nice in the evening, hence the common name "Lady of the Night" for this orchid species.