Thanks to you all for your replies. We were watering again last night and my husband said we should just pull them up and start over, instead of watering and getting nothing (another concern because we are on a well and haven't had enough rain to mention since early June, if then). I just keep thinking the tomatoes will surely start to produce. I raise a couple of heirlooms including Green Zebra, which will normally produce over 100 tomatoes per plant (my experince with them) and I've had three!!!!!! Oh and squash bugs. We got invaded last year and I'm at my wits end with them. I have tried to be an organic gardener but if ever something makes me reach for the poison it will be the squash bugs. I've pulled thousands of eggs, 100 of mature bugs and nyphms but everyday there are more. At least this year I know to keep working at it every day, last year they killed my plants. But this year I don't have squash ripening so don't know why I am so worried, guess I want to beat the little beasts! My mom in in South Arkansas and she has yet to have a single okra. Said it is shoulder high but just now getting flowers. Dad said she has the prettiest garden he's ever seen, not a lot out of it, but way more than I've had. I hope this isn't our new normal. COLD winters and HOT summers..... may have to look at a climate controlled garden!

One can use IPM (Integrated Pest Management) which says to use the least toxic product that will kill the pests. It recommends organic control but also suggests the least toxic insecticide that will do the job. Meaning, one doesn't go to the cabinet and get an insecticide that kills everything it comes into contact with. It also suggests limiting the spray to the infected area and only when the pests are present. This is just common sense, but many people spray to prevent insect pests which may cause some to build up a resistance to a particular insecticide. If we all used IPM, there'd be no problem but we usually go for the big guns right away. When I give programs and the topic of insecticides comes up, I recommend IPM. I'll recommend putting up with insect damage but if one has to spray make sure the label lists the pest and mix at the dilution rate listed on the label. Not all of us are willing to walk past an insect damaged bud or leaf. I figure the insects need to eat also and I choose butterflies and birds over insecticides. It takes a few years to get to a good balance of nature and just one insecticide application can take you back to square one. But if one has a perfect leaf or bloom phobia and they have to spray insecticide, use common sense. Remember also, you can sterilize your garden but if you're the only one in your neighbor hood doing it, you'll soon get the buggers back. It then turns into a vicious cycle. Then if you try to let the predatory insects keep your bad insects under control, remember they won't return until they have something to eat. This means you'll have damage again until they arrive in sufficent numbers to make a difference. Caterpillars eat leaves and many turn into butterflies. I'm not going to stand on a soapbox and say spraying any insecticides is terrible. I'll tell people what works for me then let them make the choice. Taking a hard line against insecticides is not much different than entolling the virtues of fresh human waste as a home fertilizer or insect/fungus spray. We all know how we felt about that! The leaves on my General Jacqueminot look like lace from rose slugs but I'm willing to put up with it. Not everyone is!

Wow so many with the same situation, although mine is not because of him losing a job in this economy. I always seemed to find the really nice guys that lacked motivation - I married two of them. My first husband was in finance, and figured that he could work fewer hours and manage to make enough. I was working and had two young children and he did not think that his free time was for housework or watching the kids even when I went to the gym - I had to get a sitter so that he would not have to commit to being home. No matter how much counseling or discussion between us could make him see how it felt to have him sitting on the front porch reading the paper while I was going crazy in the house getting lunches ready and the kids and me out of the house every morning. The neighbors even noticed! I felt if I was going to live like a single parent, I might as well be able to date, so I divorced him. And then I did the same thing again! What the heck was wrong with me?? When I met my second husband, he had a job, but all of his jobs were not long-term or careers -- he was also an under-employed carpenter. He was an awesome person, and a great step-father to my kids, but the housework was not even on his radar. However, with his more "flexible schedule", he was the one that could get a sick kid at school or be home if needed, so he was a bit of a house husband and that allowed me to concentrate on my job. But once the kids were off at college, I joked that he was my oldest child, but it really wasn't a joke. Unfortunately he died suddenly a little over a year ago, and although I miss him terribly, I am not going to make the same mistake again. I'm fortunate that I can support myself as I've been doing it for years anyway. If there is a next guy he will have to be at least where I am financially (which is not much!) and be interested in a true partnership. We all have to put up with stupid bosses and policies, but how can these men think it's OK to put their pride before their employment because they won't tolerate whatever they don't agree with? You can't be an employee and do things any way you want - we all have to suck it up for a job. If these guys didn't have a wife, I wonder what would they do? Please understand, I'm not knocking your hubbies - especially after the men I married! Many of you seem to be adapting to the new normal in your households. What makes it work is a sense of teamwork between the two of you, each doing what needs to be done. A wife can't be the breadwinner and then come home to housework & cooking while the husband plays - that situation won't last long without resentment.

Another off-topic vaccine question. What about HPV vaccinations? Anyone who has had more than one partner, or has a partner who ever had another partner, could be at risk. My doctor told me that even long-term married people can pass the infection back and forth, if one or both was ever exposed in their younger years. The virus never goes away once infected. The immune system usually makes it dormant but it can flare up decades later and infect a partner, even if you've been monogamous for a long time. And if someone becomes divorced or widowed, and remarries, they are open to new exposure regardless of age. Hopefully everyone is doing their part to eradicate HPV as well, men included. Even if you've already been exposed, there are many different strains and the vaccine protects against multiple strains.