As It Stands Now

the climbing cantaloupe...not sure if it will get much bigger due to the fact the plant
 looks a little stressed, but here's to hoping

The Garden Mouse is either still on the lose and doing less damage, was caught by a neighborhood cat, or moved on, but I never did catch him/her, which is just as well, because I don't think my heart was in it.  What I definitely have is an aphid problem in the garden, which brings in ants that seem to be eating the aphids...although no plants have died due to this combination it does make things decidedly less attractive--in the coming weeks, especially as new plants go out in the garden, the Neems oil will be coming out

the hot weather was suppose to be over {read--I was hoping it'd be in the 90's},
but towards the end of this week it crept back up  into the 100's and will be that way throughout
 the next week...the pumpkins are not liking this, and the herbs and other tender plants haven't liked
 it too much either--hopefully I don't have to do too much replanting
and things can recover as it cools off.

the corn is looking fine...

I spied a few young ears forming and am hopeful I can get a taste of this Country Gentleman variety...
my corn has never looked this good in Zone 9, so fingers crossed

I threw in some moon and star watermelon seeds at the very end of July and the vines and flowers are
looking halfway decent...I'm curious to see if I get some melons out of this since the weather will start cooling off sooner than later

oriole zinnia

I'm not sure which zinnia this one is as none of my seed packets look like this
flower...doing my research

due to the heat that's sticking around and the fact that I'm recovering from the soul-sucking virus going around The Valley, the only thing happening today is garden watering and some "research" pertinent to the garden inside the house--yes, beekeeping