Not even trying today.

 It got hot very quickly and since we had to run to the store I never got out to the garden this morning. It's very windy right now which usually indicates a change in the weather. That won't be coming for a few days because it's going to stay in the high 90's for at least another week (according to the weather app and tv). 

I went out last night to check on things and forgot to bring the fertilizer with me but I think that was for the better. The soil is still very moist which I am still amazed about how well that mulch works. Will bring my nozzle with me if I go out tonight juust in case.

I thought something was missing! I took a longer route back to the apartment and walking past this spot, suddenly realized something was missing. They cut down the jade plant on that corner! I couldn't find any better photo to compare but they cut down the jade and leave that sorry ass palm in the pot that belonged to the previous previous tenant. Oh that large green clump of leaves I believe is the same as the small clump in the before picture and it looks like Calendula. That is such an  ugly and sad looking corner now. Like everything else in the 'maintained' garden areas. Which reminds me I need to go check that larger jade near the bird of paradise and see how it's doing.

I still forlornly look at the fence bed and the outline of the future raised bed that I plan on putting there. Do I even try at this point? I'm not sure about our long term future here given our finances so with my luck, as soon as I get it assembled and filled with dirt (in about a month or so), something will happen and we will have to tear it down again (I can only hope and pray if this does happen it is for a better place).

I may end up just pulling up the cucumber because if it hasn't gotten any fruit by now it's a lost cause. Another friend said that her pumpkin never got any female flowers either so I'm wondering if it's the heat. But they are both 'summer' crops and should be okay, though I think it's more of 'summer' being about ten degrees cooler on a longer term than days on end of desert heat.  Pollinators don't even want to be out let alone people. Although I did see a Swallowtail flit by earlier and it made me smile.

The height of summer and the middle of winter there isn't much to be done in the garden. I've seen so many properties for sale that have huge, immence homes with all the extras and appointments of immensely rich...and very few actually have anything like a garden to relax in or even a vegetable garden. I suppose if you  have the money, buying groceries in large quantities for parties is the way to go but even Versailles had edible gardens and groves. But then that was built and lived in at a time when everyone had a garden because you either worked the fields or in the town and had to be self sustaining somehow and make some extra change to survive.

The opposite of the palatial mansions is a mid size mobile home plopped on a piece of land with nothing in the way of landscaping. Absolutely flat land surrounding it and maybe there was lawn there at one time but no trees or bushes at all. What the hell is the point of getting a small parcel of land and just having a house on it? Really?

This is why I dream of coming into a large sum of money and hope I am still physically able to garden. Make it educational for the local school, have some ducks maybe chickens to sell the eggs, have free fertilizer and pest control, maybe a few goats. I don't need hundreds of acres, a quarter acre with about half that for the 'farm' part. That's modest really. A community garden and farm.

Is that too much to ask?