Blotties / Early Saturday Afternoon Nina

The finalists for the 2009 Blotanical Awards (or, as I prefer to think of them, the "Blotties") were announced during my hiatus, and I am pleased to be able to say that PATSP is up for four Blotties this year. (Last year, PATSP tied with Soliloquy for best Indoor Gardening Blog, a category which was discontinued this year because not enough people think of themselves as indoor gardeners to make the category competitive, which yes, does take a bit of the shine off of the win -- and it was only ever a tie anyway, which also bruises the old self-esteem slightly because I only just found out it was a tie -- but never mind.)

The categories are:

• Best Blog Name
• Best Container Gardening Blog
• Best Educational Garden Blog
• Best Iowa Blog

and one can vote here.

I would go on here and list the friends of PATSP who are up for awards of one kind or another, and encourage you to go vote for them as well, but A) some of them are in competition with PATSP and I'm not going to encourage you to go vote against me, even if they were more deserving, which they are not . . . or maybe they are, but they can advocate for themselves if they are so inclined, and what am I, Saint Subjunctive? and B) enough friends of PATSP are in competition with one another that endorsing people quickly gets awkward. (Best Asian Blog, Best Texas Blog, and Blog of the Year were all especially tough choices for me personally.)

Traditionally, and by "traditionally" I mean "I meant to do this last year and forgot for some reason," this is the time of year when I post a bunch of flower pictures in an attempt to bribe the reader into voting for me, but you will notice that I have, instead, tried to buy your affections by not going with the light-text-on-dark-background thing I was threatening before the hiatus, and have instead merely changed the light background to a different (and slightly darker) light background. Which will have to count as this year's bribery, because hey, we're in a recession, and do you think flower pictures grow on trees, etc. etc.

Except then I think, oh, well, maybe there were some people who didn't care about the light-text-on-dark-backgrounds thing. What about them? So here are some flower pictures, never mind what I said before:

Commelina coelestis communis, day flower or blue spiderwort. I assumed, as a child, that my grandmother had planted this on purpose, when I saw a small patch on the side of Grandma and Grandpa's house. It wasn't, of course, but it's an awfully decorative weed, as weeds go.

Stokesia 'Honeysong Purple.' This was quite a few weeks ago, at ex-work. I have no idea whether they would still be flowering now or not.

Nicotiana NOID. From a Home Depot, I think, in the Quad Cities somewhere. The overall verdict on Nicotiana for me at home has been kind of mixed: the one I had did nicely for a while and then kind of fell apart; I don't know whether that's normal. I think I like this color better than the red ones I had.

Coreopsis rosea 'American Dream.' From the Menards in Iowa City. I understand the appeal of Coreopsis intellectually, but I don't much like them. I think it's that being an indoor gardener who picks up his plants a lot, I've developed an aversion to plants that get tangled up in themselves (or other plants) and need a lot of work to separate.

Anthurium 'Florida.' This plant is actually my own: it decided to flower in the living room not too long after we moved. Decent-sized flower and everything.
And then for those of you who are indifferent to text color and unmoved by flower pictures, here is an early Saturday Nina picture:


Which I think should cover all the bases. Anybody who is still unconvinced to vote for me, e-mail me your street address and I will mail you a plant or a pair of scissors or a pony or something.

Site-related: Blotanical results (with links)

PATSP has received the Blottie (I'm gonna call them that, even if nobody else does) for Best Indoor Gardening Blog. (Full list of winners and nominees here.) I considered going into an Oscar-acceptance parody speech here (". . . and I wanna thank my parents, and Jesus, and all the little people. . . .") but decided that the better way to go was to play it a little straighter than that.

So I'll just say that I appreciate Stuart's efforts to put the awards together, especially considering that the awards and the ongoing feed issues hit at more or less the same time, which I'm guessing means he was doing twice as much work on Blotanical this month as he was expecting, and very possibly four times as much as he usually would. (Stuart's Blog, Gardening Tips 'n' Ideas; Blotanical home page)

I'd also like to sincerely thank everyone who voted, whether for me or not. As a lot of you know, blogging is kind of a weird gig, in that you start doing it before you know whether anybody's listening or not, and sometimes you get feedback about whether you're doing it right, and sometimes you don't. Those of you who voted for me presumably think I'm doing okay, which is nice to hear, and those of you who didn't have just pointed me to four other blogs from which I can steal ideas.


[evil laughter, lightning, crash of thunder]

So but anyway.

Soliloquy doesn't really need the extra attention, as she already won two Blotties (Best Canadian Blog, Best Commenter) and was a nominee for two others (Best Photography, Blotanist of the Year).

Balcony Gardener is, as it sounds, not so much an indoor gardening blog as a small-container gardening blog, but there are obvious overlaps between the two. Neither of us use shovels much, for example. Also some good, solid close-up photography, which is always nice. And Canadian, which I am trying very hard to suck up to as many Canadians as possible until I know how the U.S. election has turned out. (At which point I will either return to my normal level of trying to ingratiate myself with Canadians, which is still high for an American, or redouble my efforts, depending. Anybody who knows of any good Canadian horticultural programs should really, really get in touch with me. No, seriously. You should.)

Houseplants is a friend of the blog from way back, with a particular interest in the early conservatories and Wardian cases and so forth. Plus also lots of orchid pictures.

Indoor Gardener makes me think, well, maybe we could grow basil in here after all. (There was a previous bad experience.) The question is more whether the various Euphorbia, Cereus, Synadenium, Aloe, Pandanus, Coffea, Yucca, Hatiora, etc. specimens could be persuaded to share their window with something edible. I kind of hate to ask (you know how cranky Euphorbias can be). But if I ever were to decide that I wanted to grow herbs and vegetables in the apartment, Indoor Gardener is the first place I'd go to find out how. Until then, the husband and I will just keep eating frozen pizzas.

And finally, since the celebratory Gazanias have been used very recently, as well as the Gerbera of Accomplishment, we're going to have to go with a different flower for this occasion. So: the Streptocarpus of Public Recognition.

Streptocarpus x 'Purple Martin'
In about three weeks, we'll have a blogaversary (blogIversary? Which is it? Neither one looks right to me.) happen, too. When it rains, it pours.

The . . . Blotties?, or, Don't Call Me Churly

Well. So. Nominations are open for The 2008 Blotanical Awards.

This is not uncool of Stuart (Blotanical founder) to set up and everything, but it's surprisingly difficult at the moment. The categories are either very narrow (Best South American Blog, which has four candidates for five finalist spots) or very broad (Best Newcomer Blog, which is open to any Blotanical member: I'm not sure how many that is right now, but it's got to be more than 200, for five finalist spots). This is probably how it has to be (no way to put everybody on equal footing other than to make every blog a possible nominee, however absurd it might be to list Wicked Gardener as an option for Drought-Tolerant Blog or to put Plant Crazy in contention for Best Agrarian Blog), but it also means that the same handful of blogs that already win everything (you know who I'm talking about) are likely to win these as well, which makes the whole exercise feel a little pointless.

And there is, of course, no category for indoor gardening, because there is never a category for indoor gardening. Because indoor gardening is somehow not serious. (I blame Amy Stewart.) Nor occupational gardening, either, as far as that goes. (Read the updates at the bottom of the page.)

It's a little churlish ("of, resembling, or characteristic of a churl," says the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary) of me to be critical here, seeing as how I haven't put together an award thing of my own. I mean, it's hard to stack the bricks and mortar them together; it's easy to jeer and throw rocks from the sidelines. So that's not how I mean this (though to be honest, I am just as bitter about the lack of an indoor gardening category as I sounded above). I just mean that it would be easier to feel invested in the process if I felt like there was a chance of being nominated, and it'd be easier to feel I had a chance if there were narrower categories. I'm also a little unclear on what some of the current categories are in the first place: how is Best Blog Design different from Most User-Friendly Blog? Aren't user-friendly designs good by definition, and don't good designs have to be user-friendly? And, if we're all Newcomers this year, then how is Best Newcomer Blog distinct from Blog of the Year?

And then I feel stupid because they're only internet blog awards. Meaningful, yes, within the garden blogging community, and a good way for people to be recognized for their contributions and all, but it's not like there's a gold medal and a trip to Stockholm riding on this. This competitive thing of mine is silly and unattractive (like a churl!). So I should probably just go lie down for a while.

Or, when all else fails, go meta: I should start up a betting pool for just how many awards [insert garden-blogging behemoth of your choice] is going to pick up this year.

UPDATE: Mrs. Blotanical, in comments, says that Indoor Gardening is being added, "just for [me]." Which is both unexpected and appreciated.

Though wouldn't it be "Mrs. Robinson?"

Or is she actually married to the blog aggregate? Is that legal in Australia?

Also: so are we going to go with "Blotties," then? It sounds like a line of kids' clothing. Or possibly some kind of disposable wipe.

Maybe "Blotanies?"

"Blots?"

SECOND UPDATE: The rumors are true. Indoor Gardening (which also includes balcony/patio gardening and small-space gardening in general) has been added. Thank you very much, Stuart. In your face, Amy!

-

P.S. If you wondered: a churl is basically a hick/redneck, just nine centuries ago and in England.
P.P.S. You should still join Blotanical if you have a gardening blog. It's fun.
P.P.P.S. I worry that the intent of the P.P.S. was unclear. I was being sincere.