STAYING POWER

Two months on and this inmate of the orchid rehabilitation centre on my bathroom windowsill is finally looking a bit dry and crispy around the edges. I expect to get at least another couple of weeks of colour and then some elegantly papery dead flowers hanging on until I can be bothered to remove them, and then more flowers sometime next year (if I ignore it for long enough). Buying orchids marked down in the supermarket as past their sell-by date definitely pays off.