Flowers as a Symbol of Friendship - or not

How lovely to present some delicate pansies as a gesture of friendship.

But I'm not sure how a friend would take it if I offered her one of these flowers out of my garden. This is Dranunculus Vulgaris, also known as a Voodoo Lily  (incorrectly, I think) and Dragon Arum - and, yes, it is as huge as it looks.  The bloom is several feet long.

These things grow on the side of my house, where, despite all of my efforts, they are tremendously happy. Let me just clarify that I did not plant these. They came with the house. The previous owner died, and while I can't blame it on these flowers, if she had been teetering on the edge they may just have pushed her over.

Oh, but they're so uh lovely! Yes, and like other plants, they need to be pollinated. But unlike most other plants, these are pollinated by flies not bees.  And in order to attract flies, it helps if you smell bad. In fact, if you can manage to smell like week-old roadkill, then you can greatly increase your chances of successful pollination. And that is exactly what these flowers smell like. It is not a faint smell either, it is an evil cloud that wafts and drifts.

This plant has another odd quality, which is that the smell only lasts for one day. After that you can cut them and put them in a vase in your house with no trace of odor. Often I cut them down before that, so that the mailman doesn't contact the police about rotting corpses. This year we endured the smell so that my neighbor could cut them down and give them to a friend - as a symbol of friendship I suppose.

Oh, if you're still here, this is the back of the lovely pansy card.