Probably because the weather's been running about 10 degrees hotter than normal lately, but the vegetables have really started to take off. Did up some temporary tomato cages (using the stakes & string method from last year). We'll see how that holds up. I have one snap-together plastic cage that I'm saving for the Super Sweet 100 but I might buy some more for the other plants if the homemade version doesn't work out.

Slate has a nice series of articles for the beginning gardener: part one, part two, and part three. There are, of course, a lot of places you can go to get this kind of info but I found this to be thorough and concise. Another thing I noticed is that our garden here has a lot of the same plants she recommends, inc. echinacea, rudbeckia, coreopsis.

It seems that today is one of only two days each year when the sun sets dead center on all the crosstown streets in Manhattan. Via Gothamist, here's some photos from flickr of Manhattanhenge.