Now for something completely different.

Goodbye orchids, Hello Cactus.

Some will like it, some will think it brash. But there is no denying that it demands attention. One of the fascinating things about cacti is that, like this one you can watch it grow slowly for five years with no sign of flowers and then suddenly on some sunny day - whoosh, within two or three days this is what happens.
This, along with twenty others, lives on windowsills in the house from October to April and the goes on a shelf in the Alpine House for the summer.

Thirty years ago when I had more of them I might have hazarded a guess at its name. It might be an Echinocactus but I am not sure.
The extra shows it not long before its joyful outburst.

Anyway, I like its brash look at me attitude.