la_belle_laide | ZONE DENIAL

The condition is "zone denial," I guess, when a person has the insane desire to grow tropical plants this far up north--zone 8 and down. Me, I'm zone 6b - 7a, and am dying to plant palm trees, banana and ginger lily in my yard. Kind of nice, then, to find Palmsnorth, all about planting tropicals up north and getting them to actually live.

Unfortunately, I'm noticing that most people count "cold hardy" as plants that can grow in the Georgia and the Carolinas. You know, as if it gets, like, cold down there and stuff. Isn't that adorable? This is when I want to slap people and say, "You don't know what cold is! I've studied the history of cold, you haven't! You're glib!" (Only not.)

This all came about today when I came home and got my "hardy" banana and maypop delivered ... or really, redelivered, since I got the same damn things last year. The maypop died the day after I planted it (in April,) and the banana did beautifully all summer, and then died over the winter.

Anyway, any day now I'll be getting some mock orange, which is going to be awesome and is hardy all the way to zone FIVE, biznatches!