Gone to seed

I am tremendously fond of the phrase "gone to seed," used in the context of Joaquin Phoenix-style degeneration (not sure who used the phrase first on Joaquin, but it pops up in half the reviews of I'm Still Here). It is a remarkably apt phrase for any number of conditions: I'm still in pajamas, I've gone to seed; where did that beard come from? He's gone to seed; What a great camping trip that was, we've all gone to seed; Did Aunty Poppy just mistake me for the late Peter Sellers? She's gone to seed. The photo above was taken in our backyard, out by the "lettuce patch" that had provided us, for a time, with boutique heads of butter lettuce. Today, as you can see, the lettuce has gone rogue, spiraling up into a mutant cone of dis-cultivation and frilling its seedy ends in the breeze, like a drug-sodden Hollywood star.