fallen-london
I have been Attending to the Needs of a Singular Plant for some time now.
I try to do my best, but it seems that all the Opportunities that I have to care for my little plant are solely luck based. I find myself constantly taking one step forward and two steps back.
How can I consistently improve the state of my Singular Plant?
These acquaintances are unlocked in several places, and they have storylets for increasing your friendship with them, usually via buying them something or doing a favour.
The Repentant Forger - If you end up with your Suspicion above 8, you'll be thrown in New Newgate again, and can meet him via an Opportunity Card. Befriending him will allow you to meet him in Veilgarden, where he can help you with increasing your Fascinating quality.
The Regretful Soldier - You can met The Regretful Soldier via an opportunity card while in Watchmaker's Hill, as long as your Dangerous quality is above 45. If you talk him down and prevent him from fighting (which involves having a Persuasive quality of around 45), he'll become your friend.
The Sardonic Music-Hall Singer - A character within the 'Missing Person: Absconding Devil' series of storylets in Ladybones Road (unlocked at Watchful 12), as well as the 'Bag A Legend' ambition. She also appears in an Opportunity Card that is unlocked with a Persuasive quality of at least 89. Each of these will let you befriend her.
The Wry Functionary - If you attend the Ambassador's Ball in Veilgarden (Persuasive quality of 56 needed) and get the 'The Darling of the Ambassador's Ball' quality as a result, you'll be able to correspond with him via another storylet in Veilgarden. On a rare success, you'll gain him as an Acquaintance, and you can meet with him in the Shuttered Palace once you gain access to it.
The first step in changing your profession is leaving your current one.
You can make a resignation letter for yourself by following the "Choose a new Profession" Storylet located at your Lodgings (note that if you are resigning from an Advanced Profession, you will lose the unique item associated with it.):
Once that is out of the way, you can then take up a new Training Profession or Advanced Profession.
Training Professions help improve your main qualities up to level 70. After that, you'll want something a little more advanced. It's a little out of the scope of this question to list the details of every possible profession, and there is already a good article about it that you can go check out at the Echo Bazaar wiki.
To gain a new Training Profession, just use the "Adopt a Training Profession" Storylet that you can find at your Lodgings after quitting your old Profession.
Advanced Professions require you to have connections with certain factions, and opportunities to gain a new Advanced profession are only available through "Connected" type Opportunity cards.
If you don't want to wait for a certain Opportunity card to show up, you can spend some Fate on the "Arrange Favourable Circumstances" Storylet and use the resulting Favourable Circumstances to arrange a meeting with your contacts using the aptly named "Arrange a meeting with your contacts" Storylet.
Both of these storylets can be found at your Lodgings, under "Write Letters":
Best Answer
There are a few different Opportunity cards regarding your Singular Plant: one of them is The Noted Orchid-Grower Consults, which gives you a chance to improve your plant (and a chance the grower is entirely wrong, and gives you incorrect advice). As you've noticed, it's random. But there are two other Opportunity cards that can help: Your House-plant, which allows you to improve your shrubbery by spending Moon-Pearls, and Your Green Companion, which allows you to grow your green thing by spending Jade. (You can also sing or talk to your plant on those two cards, which has a small chance of improving things and no chance of damaging the plant, but it's chancy.)
If the Random Number God hates you, just discard all of the Noted Orchid-Grower cards, and spend money on the other two. If you're cheap, then discard the Noted Orchid-Grower cards and sing or talk to your plant with the other two; it will be slower, but much cheaper.