Hibiscus rosa-sinensis Flower

There is a house in town with a hedge of the more ornamental Hibiscus. I should take a photo of it.

I love hibiscus! When I lived in Mission San Jose, Fremont I used to have a beautiful hedge of mixed colors that meshed together. I planned it that way and had so many compliments.

Hi Delonix! How has your summer been? Things are looking nice and green and flowery... and tropical! I like to check in with you and Stan around this time of year just for a lift. Hope all is well in your neck-of-the-woods!

Hello Lori,

How are you doing?

It’s going pretty well here. We had an unusually cool winter and spring. Lots of rain, which we needed to break the historic drought in California and all of the western US. We also had very unusual Tropical Storm Hilary which hit us in August. It wasn’t too bad, because many people were prepared. We had some strong winds and over 3 inches of here in 24 hrs (some parts of San Diego County had 4 to 5 inches of rain). Overall, summer wasn’t too hot. Although, it’s been pretty warm to hot in the last three weeks here.

I had seen reports of floods and fires along the west coast of NA... my relatives in B.C. had a very active fire season...we had a wildfire burning near us! that was in June... but the rest of the summer was reasonably moist until we hit the end of August and then things dried up completely for a couple of months...and now we're getting snow...
How are the ocean temps these days... no more El Nino's brewing out there? glad to hear you've had some rain, it was dismal looking at pics of the Hoover Dam...and the low levels of the reservoirs. Better days ahead, for us all, I hope.

Lori,

I saw another bad fire season in the northwest US and Canada. It so strange to see such big fires in that part of the world.

I’m guessing it’s typical to have snow this time of year in your area of Canada?

The El Niño has gone from strong to very strong in the last couple of weeks. According to the data, we’re expecting a wet winter season in Southern California. We’ll find out over the next few months. It’ll be good for reservoirs.