Misty Wednesday in the Asian Collections US National Arboretum

 

Hardy aspidistra on path to the Pagoda

 

 

Musa basjoo

 

Hydrangea paniculata 'Phantom'

 

Sternbergia lutea

Hurricane Irma weighs in on our retirement plans

Or at least the time frame. I'm at the computer, in Maryland, alternating between looking at pictures of the Florida garden and house, and following Irma's progress. She moves powerfully, slowly, and seemingly now, inexorably, towards our Florida oasis.

So the question now is, "will the retirement house be standing two days from now. It'll really throw a kink in our plans to move to the Florida house if there isn't a Florida house. Of course we can repair, rebuild, replace..., but I'm thinking contractors will be in short supply for a long time as tens of thousands of others will be in our same condition. Actually, I feel guilty comparing our situations; we have a perfectly fine house here in Maryland. We're safe and dry.

Of course the garden will be okay, maybe minus a tree or two, or three. And that would be okay. Sun is good. More sun means more flowers. Plus, things grow fast in Florida. We can plant a few live oaks and maybe a couple more interesting trees and 10 years from now, the shade is back.

Rebuilding isn't a totally bad thing either. We could add that bedroom we want, modernize the kitchen, hey, I'm been wondering if a bidet wouldn't be a good addition as I enter my dotage. Though I don't suppose we needed to destroy the house to add one. And, I'm sure the building codes would assure that anything we build would be able to survive this type of storm with zero or minimal damage. All good things. A rule of thumb used to be 100-110$/square foot to build in Central Florida. I'm thinking that just jumped 50%. Plus, "where do all these contractors come from?" I guess we'll find out.