Hi Angie! Thanks for the fun thread!
>> this plant doesn't like a lot of moisture
>> don't want to add voluntary drowning to my crimes.... but if it doesn't look better in the morning I'm gonna rinse the roots. ..
Right! What do we do when we want to flush a pot, but don't want to drown the roots? It's too late to go back in time and use a faster-draining, coarser and more "open" potting mix.
You could pull it out of the pot, prune the root ball, wash it down to bare roots, and re-pot the plant. But who wants to do that?
My suggestion is to "extend" the capillary zone of the pot by setting the pot on top of a towel or folded-over absorbent cotton cloth (like flannel or Tee shorts) that will wick a lot of water.
If the fabric touches the soil through the holes in the bottom of the pot, it will wick water out of the bottom of the pot until that bottom is no wetter than the towel. (Of course water will drain down from the upper layers of soil in the pot to the bottom, as the bottom dries out.)
If you let the towel drape down off the edge of your deck, or dangle down a few feet, and allow it to drip into a tray or something, the potting mix becomes part of a tall capillary column where capillary attraction PLUS GRAVITY pull water out of your pot.
Now you can water it heavily knowing that the water will be mostly wicked away in a few hours, and the roots are less likely to drown.
