A lot of people have sensibly started their lives over where they wound up after the hurricane instead of heeding the mayor's call to return. Those that have returned are often finding ruined homes, but some are still trying to rebuild. The city has been declared pumped dry, so now they have to remove the mud and moldy debris.

I have to admire their love of their city, but their leadership is astounding. On the other hand, our city leaders aren't exactly something to brag about, either, and are altogether too fond of sports teams and new arenas for them for civic improvements. I suppose our monuments to civic pride aren't much better than the casinos. There has been some talk of turning at least one old arena into a casino. They're always a gamble no matter what they plan to play in them.

The weather is more like fall here with some morning fogs. It is still drier than normal, so I keep running the hose on the garden. The scalped crepe myrtles are sprouting new growth and may yet have fluffy crowns of blooms like wigs atop their bare spears. The roses are trying to bloom again as well. The tomatoes are growing larger on their vines but still quite green

One of the cats brought home a dead rat this morning, a fairly large, plump one. They evidently aren't quite gone, but must be considerably lower in numbers. I'm not sure if it is due to the lack of water sources or the poor showing in my garden leaving little for them to eat. We do get a small flock of robins when I leave the hose on long enough to form a good sized puddle for a while, so the wildlife is not quite gone. The only things we have in abundance are mosquitoes, and the city is sending out the spraying trucks in the evenings fairly regularly.

I outfoxed myself with my cleverness in saving money on more irises. I got a fall sale catalog from one of my favorite gardening companies a few weeks ago with a $25 dollar coupon if you bought at least $25 in plants. Aha, just the thing to buy more irises for Mom since she still didn't have enough from the last batch I bought. The poor things later got mowed when the garden got scalped, too, and one hasn't come back.

So I've been waiting for the new irises to show up. I had ordered the irises, some Junebearing strawberries, a lavender plant, and a three dwarf citrus trees collection. I figured I could sneak in the last three items with the $25 coupon.

Well, I got a card for a $5 refund for my next order because they ran out of irises and strawberries for the season. I had to confess to Mom about what was coming. The lavender and citrus trees should be here any day now. I don't know if I can find more irises this late in the season.

I did get a fifth sweater done and a sweater box shipped to Knit for Kids. I've got another one started from the last three skeins of yarn. I've only got a few yards left from the other skeins, so I'm going to have to look for more yarn soon. I ought to spend some time on those backlogged projects also waiting to be done.