Random plant event: Lycopersicon lycopersicum 'Super Beefsteak' flower

I'm not fond of unprocessed tomatoes. I eat a lot of pasta and pizza, so I do actually eat a lot of tomatoes, but I don't especially like them. (I'm also not a big fan of cheese, as a rule, but somehow tomatoes, which I don't like, and cheese, which I don't like, are both just fine in lasagna and pizza.) I'm not really a huge fan of tomato plants, either, though I don't mind them too bad. Opinions at work differ on whether the plants' smell is pleasant or unpleasant; I kind of like it, personally.

This was one of the first plants to flower; a lot of the plants in gallon pots are flowering now, though.



Although my sense of smell has recently been a little confused, because of my cold (which is still working its way through the co-workers: so far, A's daughter brought it home from school and gave it to A, who gave it to the boss, who gave it to B, who gave it to me, who gave it to C, and I may be missing a step or two in there), this is a very olfactorily confusing time in the greenhouse.

We've gotten some jasmine in, and some gardenias; the flower shop still frequently has hyacinths available, though they don't tend to stick around; the marigolds are blooming now, there's a table and a half devoted to tomato plants, I've caught the occasional whiff of strawberry (there have already been a few red fruits, though they tend not to stay: either the pot is purchased, or someone pulls the fruit off and eats it, or it gets damaged and rots and has to be extracted from the pot), the geraniums have a whole greenhouse to themselves to stink up, plus being the bulk of another, and then there are the petunias, all the wet-earth smells, smells wafting in from outside (delivery truck exhaust, e.g.), plant-waste smells, and the standing-water smells. I'm not saying you could blindfold me and plug my ears and I'd still be able to find my way around by smell, but I'm not saying I couldn't, either. It'd be an interesting experiment to try.