It would appear that I'm less black-thumbed than I first suspected.

Mum, being the helpful type, had spotted a bonsai show at a nearby town hall. She figured there would have to be someone there who could diagnose what was wrong with my bonsai (apart from rampant neglect). So mum and I took my stick-in-a-pot to a bonsai expert.

It was pronounced mostly dead on arrival. Of course, there's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead because mostly dead is slightly alive.

Which was fortunate because if it were all dead, I wasn't in the mood to go through its clothes and look for loose change.

Apparently all I needed to do was water it a bit more often, feed it and stick it on the kitchen windowsill so that it could get lovely morning sun and it would make a bigger comeback than Lazarus.

I'm not entirely convinced. You see, it only has two live leaves left on it (and one sad little curled up brown one that just won't fall off). But I walked it around the bonsai show and pointed at other bonsai to inspire it. I took it home and watered it well, fed it the bonsai equivalent of sushi (full of fishy, seaweedy goodness) and stuck it in the kitchen window. There is a proper sized fig tree outside my kitchen window. As my bonsai is a fig tree, I figure they can be mates. Just as long as my little fig doesn't get delusions of grandeur.

"Think it'll work?"
"It would take a miracle."