Christmas? Already?

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My Christmas Cactus is blooming! This poor plant has a long history of abuse. I bought it around Easter 7 years ago, and its blooms had been forced. It has bloomed sporadically and sparsely over the years. My house doesn't get very much light, so in good weather I put it out on the porch. The year I got it, I had it on the porch when we had a terrible hail and wind storm. The wind blew my roof off and in the process turned my porch on it's edge (it's not attached to the house) dumping several plants I had setting out. There wasn't much left of the plant when the storm was over, but I repotted it and nipped the damaged leaves off which barely left little nubs growing out of the pot. It has grown and flourished pretty well since then, but I never knew when or if it would bloom. This summer I set it on the rebuilt porch and forgot to bring it in when I knew a hail storm was coming. Again it was pretty badly beaten and I picked the worst damage off. The weather started dipping into the upper 40's at night a week or so ago and after the first really cold night I decided I'd better bring in the Christmas Cactus. It had buds on it! I thought, oh well when I bring it in they'll fall off and it won't bloom again this year. I was wrong. In spite of the ragged condition of the leaves, the buds have opened and there are several new buds showing. So the moral of this story is, if your Christmas Cactus won't bloom, forget all about the advice to make sure it gets 12 hours of total darkness for a month before you want it to bloom. Just set it outside and forget it!