Everyone has been telling me what an usual season it's been here in zone 6b, and I - the zone 10 native - dutifully purse my lips, knit my brows in sympathetic concern and murmur, "Yes, isn't it, though?" as if I have a clue. Because I don't. Not one (but I suspect it was Mr. Gercens in the conservatory with the water wand). I come from the land o' drought where water has to be borrowed from the Colorado River. This thing called rain is quite a novelty for me and there has been lots of it. Not that I'm complaining - there's nothing quite like a ripping thunderstorm to get the blood pumping - but my garden is starting to get grumpy.
A week ago Sunday, this was the view from my front porch:
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And the fireworks were pretty spectacular...
After the storm blew through, I wandered out to inspect the damage and found most of my garden submerged (yeah, I planned that moat...cough...).
Even C.B. joined me in surveying the carnage and had a hard time finding a way to ford the stream. 
Most plants made it through and even the corn - which was literally blown sideways - righted itself in a matter of days, but my beautiful Borage bit the dust. I had hoped it would perk up once the soil had a chance to dry a bit, but it gave up and went to that great nursery in the sky. In its place I've planted some variegated Sage and Lemon Verbena, but I'll miss the bees buzzing happily in the pretty blue blossoms.
Early one morning I stood and admired how the Mina lobata erupted into flame as the sunlight touched the garden but noticed more damage. The sturdy Mina weathered the storm like a real trooper, sticking out multiple tongues of floral fire in a botanical raspberry at Mother Nature, but it looked a little wiry around waist high.
And I said to myself, "Oh, deer..."
Looks like I'm going to have to hire my classmate, our resident deer hunter, to hide out in my corn maze with his trusty bow and arrow to protect my garden. The deer love to graze their way through, nibbling succulent stems down to nubs so that we have virtually nothing left to show for our gardening labors.
Finding ways to foil the deer is one thing, but for the next couple of days more isolated thunderstorms are predicted which means a soggy garden. I can't very well put umbrellas over every plant so I guess the only thing a gardener can do with Mother Nature is weather it out (bad pun intended) and hope it doesn't stay wet for long. Fingers crossed!
Don't even think about it, cat!
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