I appreciate everyone's feedback, and here's what I think I've got (other than a wellspring of humorous chuckles from SO). 'Big green' appears to be a different plant than 'big white'. The leaves are deeply notched in comparison, and the rind is very hard, even when small. 'Big white', I thought, might be a volunteer from a farmer's market reject, so I picked up a couple likely candidates and sliced all open to compare. The known zuc was sweet and thin skinned - so thin you could easily scratch it. Big green's skin was always dense, even when small, and the seed pattern was much larger. Big white's skin was also thicker, and a small one had a very raw, underripe taste. However, the seed pattern looks like the zuc, and it did taste zuc-like. Interestingly, Big green's skin is turning yellow in the sun. hmmm.... So I think I have a feral zuc - that will end up stacked like firewood - and some sort of squash tbd. To further my study, I bought 'Moon and stars' watermelon plant and a spaghetti squash plant. The watermelon looks like a watermelon, even when it's pea-sized. The SS hasn't set fruit yet, but the leaves are the closest in shape. I've posted pix of the sliced vegs - insight welcome! Here is a link that might be useful: veggie pix

I am going to try to stick it out but it just looks so different and not comfortable or familiar at all to navigate. I don't know if you will permit me to link a very helpful site, which is http://www.city-data.com/forum/ It started out I believe as more of a location guide ( it has forums for each state and region) and then also has toward the bottom a listing of other forums for all sort of topics (entertainment- the book one is great and use it for all my reading suggestions).........and they also have a house one. There I said it. It won't replace this but it's a very nice useful forum for all sorts of stuff.

Wow, I think you nailed it! Thank you so much.

IT"S ALIVE has changed to "WilL IT SURVIVE this afternoon. Here is poor Joe , A "Johnny Got his Gun Reference" He is soundlessly yelling for help or singing with his mouthful. That small brown mushy spot grew the more I dug into it. After picking away at it with my utility knife I went and sharpened the side of an old measuring spoon from a long ago broken cannister and started to clean up my digging with a sharp scooper. It got dusted with sulfur and un potted it due to some soft small roots that I found . It needed a root trimming. Here Mr. Joe Bottoms is resting callusing his wounds in the shade of a Bilbergia windii before being potted up in a slightly raised manner to elevate the wound above the soil line and to further accentuate the growing caudex and gnarly roots. Joe is gaining character and grace under pressure..... well, maybe I won't go that far.