Sammy, it's too bad that you had to see SD in this drought. My parents lived in San Diego for a number of years, and I visited them often - I always marveled at the beautiful plants and flowers, especially in neighborhoods that were fairly near to the ocean. But, of course, San Diego was always basically a desert next to an ocean - an ideal climate for growing succulents, which were magnificent. I myself live in Sacramento, and yes, we are near the fires. It's a bad year, as all the vegetation in the foothills and the mountains is so dry. And, while it's true that drought years (like earthquakes) are part of living in California, many of us are feeling that this drought cycle could be a long one. Some people have plowed up their front lawns and put in drought-tolerant plants. We who love roses are hoping that we can baby them through - many of the roses in the Old City Cemetery Rose Garden have come from places in the foothills where they survived on their own without anyone caring for them for years, so we know that they are survivors! I hope that you can visit San Diego later on under happier circumstances. And I'm glad your daughter is OK!

Well, I know New Dawn isn't considered an "old" rose, but it's been growing in my yard for over 80 years. My 100 yr old home has only had two prior owners and I have a record of most of the original plantings. I've replanted 3 natural rootings along with the two mother plants. There was another deep red, once bloomer that I thought was Dr Huey, but that died so I'm guessing it was something else. :( I also have two smaller beds with Orlean polyanthas of various colours. Mme N. LeVavasseur and another that looks similar, but isn't fragrant. I've Id'ed the ones that died as being in the Koster family and am replacing them. So far I have Margo Koster. My neighborhood is oldish with wonderful mature plantings most originally done with a lot of thought and expertise, but new owners have tended to have a scorched earth policy towards this aesthetic. I fondly remember an old couple in their late nineties carefully tending to what I now realize were probably OGRs and other amazing plants, but I was too shy to ask for cuttings back then. I so regret it now. They died within a week of one another and the new owners pulled out every last plant and almost every tree. It broke my heart and looked ridiculous as the humongous house looked disproportionate to the lot size, whereas before it snuggled right it. (I do admit a few of the trees did need removal.) Their new plantings have now grown up, but when I see the house, I always see it how it used to look.

It has been very very hazy here for the past week, and they say that it is actually smoke from the Southern CA fires! We are 400 miles away. It is supposed to be dry and windy here for the next few days, and we have not had any rain for 3-4 weeks. Much of the entire area around SF Bay is under a "fire watch". Berkeley (which last burned in the 1920s - my grandmother used to tell me about it) has asked everyone who lives in the wooded hills (just like the Oakland hills which burned a few years ago - steep, narrow windy roads) to park their cars in garages of otherwise off the streets, so that fire equipment can use the streets if necessary. They are serious - it is scary. Jackie

Moses, our responses to Jeri were both posted at the same time - thank you for your lovely sentiments. I hope the cold spells all over the eastern 2/3rds of the country have not affected you very much. Yes, permanent changes definitely need to be made - here in No Cal the various local governments have been doing "controlled burns" and shrub grubbing, etc. on public land for a decade at least, but evidently they do not do that in LA, and they get WAY less rain than we do, so the native vegetation there is short bushes all over the hills which are full of resin (which is how they survive that climate), and they explode in fires and then burn like torches for a long time. Add that to a political climate where the Fire Depts have been starved for resources for years, and the "environmentalists" have been able to prevent controlled burns (because they create unhealthy smoke!), and you could call this a man-made disaster. I don't think there has been as large a US fire over areas which are so dense with houses since the famous San Francisco fire of 1906. SFPD has a nifty piece of equipment which allowed them to put out fires in SF after the Loma Prieta EQ of 1989, when the old story "there is no water in the fire hydrants!" happened because of all of the water pipes broken by the EQ. It is basically a mobile fire hydrant(s) thingy, which they connected to their fire boat (basically an enormous floating water pump) in SF Bay by splicing lots of fire hoses together. Then they went into local sports bars, (I have seen a clip of this happening on TV - one firefighter opened the door and asked for volunteers, and dead silence resulted, broken only by the sound of everyone's beers being put down on the tables, after which all of the "able bodied men" stood up and followed him out of the bar, without saying anything. They needed a lot of volunteers, as the Bay where the fire boat was was at 8-9 blocks away, and the fire hose was so heavy they needed a person every 4-5 feet of it to carry it. I am hoping some of the people in LA will get this info from the SFPD, who of course has rigs down there helping. The photos of all of those mansions burning up in Malibu, sitting right on the beach, with the entire Pacific Ocean right there, made me really mad. Of course, this is not something you can jury-rig at the last moment during a fire - it would need pre-planning, which was evidently not on the politicians priority list. Jackie