Day 11,877: Dante's Seventh Circle Of Hell is actually kind of brown and twiggy

It's not enough that everything died during the heatwave ... the watermelons, the peppers, the basil, everything died and it wasn't from lack of water (I watered as often as I could without drowning everything) but the plants simply burned. The leaves had actual burn marks from the scorching sun. Nothing could take twenty straight days of 112, 118, 109, 110 degrees except the succulents and desert plants.

It was fine, ya'll. I made my peace with it and said, "Woo hoo, look at how big that cactus has gotten!" My cactus loves the heat, and so I love it. From afar, of course.

With the weather cooling down, however, I was sure the worst was over. Marine layer! Temps in the high eighties! Maybe stuff will grow again where once there was grass. Life regains a glimmer of hope. And with hope returns the will to shop, since I can safely enter the no-A/C hellhole also knows as "my Jeep" to run errands and go to the pet store and Target and get gas and life! is! grand!

Unless you are the hedges. More specifically, my hedges. Which were left unguarded as I threw caution to the wind and ran errands instead of holding fast and firm as the protector of all that remains green and alive in my yard.