Obviously I've been away. Haven't stopped growing food, I'm still at it. But the smoke was horrendous, even healthy people without respiratory illness were coughing and complaining of sore eyes and burning throats.
But I kept on, in limited fashion, in containers.
Recently I've overhauled about seven of the 57 cm nursery pots and replanted them. Tonight I had a nice meal of onion, rice, and long beans that came from containers. I did buy the rice in a supermarket, but I'm still growing all my own vegetable crops. I'm currently harvesting Swiss chard, collards, onion, leek, long bean pods, sage, Malabar spinach, and parsley. Every year or so, I have to dump the big pots and replace the sticks in the bottom or they get all waterlogged.
The long beans Vigna unguiculata variety Green Pod Red Seed are doing especially well.
The containers didn't budge during Hurricane Irma. For once all the weight of that wet soil was a positive thing. Moving those things around can be a challenge. We had winds here that went well over a hundred miles an hour (probably over 200 kph), the eyewall went right over the house and then all the wind stopped. I've been inside hurricane eyes before, but this one was much bigger. We were in the eye for about a half hour. Lost a lot of trees, still haven't cut them all up. I keep waiting for the air to clear. It took me months just to gather up all the pine branches that covered all the ground.
The weather's been hot, heat indexes over a hundred every day (upper 30's Celsius). June is always a tough month, my body takes time to adapt to the tropical air. But nothing stops me, really. I just go more slowly when things are difficult.
