March in London, or "What are Begonias supposed to look like?"

My poor, sad, confused house-plant. I have no idea really how to care for it, or if I'm even supposed to at this time of year. I just looked at a bunch of pictures on the interwebs of what begonias are supposed to look like, and...mine doesn't look like that. It has one sad and strange looking cluster of flowers dangling off to one side and is otherwise a green, sprawling mess. Most of the leaves look happy and it has new growth but it's not the compact, flower-laden plant you see in the pictures.



I just took a lot of pictures of it with flash so that may confuse it, I don't know. I can just see all its chloroplasts screaming "I'm blind! Oh the Humanity!" (begoniaty?)



I water it when the soil gets dry, it is well-drained and gets as much sunlight as it can (not much, it's London and it's March) and I've fertilized it once or twice. I just have no idea if it looks the way it is supposed to, if it is happy and thriving or on its last legs. Should I put it outside when it gets warmer? Should I prune it? I put it in a larger pot about four months ago and it got bigger, but maybe I shouldn't have done that. But it has flowers at all now, whereas when we first got here it had none, and continued having none until I repotted it. I worry inordinately about this plant.




I think I have a sort of ET relationship with my lone house-plant. When I'm all seasonal-affective so is it, or perhaps I just imagine it to be so. I'm not getting enough sun, so Windowplant is likewise in the dark. I tried growing cilantro on the windowsill and it sprouted, looked around for about five minutes, and died. Well screw you too, dumb herb. I'm nervous to start any seedlings for the summer 'cos I'm pretty sure they'll bail on me too. I'm not going to bother with aubergines this year, but I'm eager to try courgettes with the assistance of fungicide. That stuff makes a mountainous heap of difference (between having courgettes and...not)

London has this cute tendency to cloud over for the brightest part of the day. Like today. It was cloudy all morning until about noon, when it cleared up partway, got me all excited...then clouded over again until just now. It is currently too dim to enjoy the clear sky, and Windowplant is not getting anything out of it. I pruned some dead twigs off my Big Pink Plant in the cold cloudy gloom, but it doesn't look like it wants to bloom this year. It has buds, but they look to be leaves. FAIL.