One of our neighbors offered to let us take a cutting from one of her succulents growing behind her house. The plant itself looks like it might be a variety of cholla (opuntia). It grows like a small tree with branches that dangle the little pods seen in the image.

We looked on the internet to see if we could figure out exactly what genus and species it is so we can evaluate its growth and flowering habits. I’m betting that our fellow desert dweller, Crotalus can help us figure this out. Click on the image to enlarge.

One furniture store delivered our Bedroom set on Monday. Today, the other furniture store delivered our dining set and the great room set. Milestone 4 is now mostly complete with the large item deliveries.

In the composite image you can see (top left) the bed, nightstands and lamps, (top right) the great room set, (bottom left) detail pattern on the love seat and (bottom right) the dining set. Click on the image to enlarge.

Dilbert gets some insight into the greenbat mentality . . .

This morning, I went in to the little wash in the back yard and broke off a couple of opuntia leaves to add to the cactus and rock garden where we planted come of the imported cacti yesterday. There are several native cacti on the back side of the yard. One cactus was from a spiny green cactus similar to prickly pear, but with longer needles. The other had purple flesh and a couple of flower pods. The latter looked like “Kermit the Frog” when I finally got it into the ground. We transported some boulders and other colorful rocks to give accents to the garden beside the RV drive on the west side of the house. Click on the image to enlarge.

One of the succulents we transported from California is this epiphyllum or “Cactus Orchid.” Today, one of the flower pods opened to reveal this brilliant canary yellow flower. This variety is called Frülingsgold, which translates to “Spring Gold” in English. Click on the image to enlarge.

In addition to about 15 small cacti we brought from the California home, these two fairly large (and heavy) barrel cacti made the trip (almost*) without incident. The one on the left is a Golden Barrel cactus and on the right is a Devil’s Tongue cactus.

Most of the cacti we brought will go into the ground around the outside of the courtyard since we don’t want to have any cacti with needles and sharp spines inside where the dogs will be allowed to be loose. We have chosen no-thorn shrubs and flowering bushes for that area.

* Unloading the Golden Barrel, Bob scratched the sh*t out of his left inside forearm on its sharp needles. There was no real damage though and no spines were embedded beneath his skin, thank goodness - they can be hard to get out and easily become infected.

We will be putting both of these in the ground which is long overdue for them since they are becoming rootbound in their pots. Our cactus and succulent garden is going to be coming along nicely.

Using smilies or emoticons on Wordpress® weblog sites. The table above summarizes the little graphic images available to bloggers and commenters on sites that use the Wordpress publishing platform. We. of course, have been using it for several years. Feel free to include any of these in your comments here or on the other blog. Click on the image above to enlarge.

Obama’s intervention in Libya is typical of the lawless administration’s tactics.

I had a dental appointment in Santa Monica today. After we were finished there, we drove back to the house along the coast. The weather looks pretty in this picture, but it’s merely a brief reprise from more stormy weather to come again. The beach is mostly deserted in spite of the sunlight because the temperature was only a balmy 58°s;. Click on the image to enlarge.