My New Plant

We had an eventful and uneventful weekend here.  Justin had his tonsils out on Friday morning so he hasn't left the house since.  If you aren't aware, tonsillectomies for adults are more traumatic than they are for kids because the tonsils attach to the side of the throat as you age. He can't lift more than 10 pounds for two weeks or drive on his pain meds.  So we haven't been doing much but our routine is quite strange.  The kids don't know what to think of Daddy being home all day watching TV on the bed.  He said it feels better today so that's good but the swelling is still there and also the risk of the incisions opening which would require a trip to the ER so I really don't want him to go overboard. 

Yesterday his office sent a delivery from a florist and instead of a bouquet it was a live plant. 

Would you look at that tropical beauty.  Of course, we know whose plant this is really going to be...mine.  The florist didn't even include a tag with any information about what kind of plant this is!  I had to ask my favorite hometown florist and she told me its a Bromeliad.  They need indirect sunlight and water once a week.  I can handle that, I think!  I have had a lot of florist plants in this house and they rarely survive so I hope I can beat the odds with this one. 

The red part is the flower and I read that you are supposed to cut the flower off (with a sterile scissor...sure...a sterile scissor...I'll get right on that...) once it dies and continue to care for the plant and it will grow babies or "pups" which you can remove and replant.  Hmmm...it's going to look like a subtropical USDA zone 9-11 wonderland in here if I succeed!  This plant is probably wondering what it is doing on the border of zones 3 and 4.