Mad gardening skills

I cannot believe it's late July in the Missouri Ozarks and our little garden bed tucked in at the corner of the house looks like this.
Our summer has been so much cooler and rainier than usual, up until the last two weeks or so. The past several days have been absolute steambaths, with temperatures well into the nineties and high humidity. Today we had a significant rainstorm and the air feels clean and cool again. If this is climate change, bring it on. I'm very glad I got the beds mulched three weeks ago, so they were able to withstand the heat wave and still look wonderful. I usually have a yard full of crispy critters by late July.

Another kind of critter is on my radar, though. There's a little calico cat hanging around the house. I thought perhaps she lived up the street, but she's looking gaunt and acts more like a feral than a stray. She's very hungry and seems to be looking for a quiet, safe place to rest when she's over here. I think she may be related to our big tom, Longshanks. They have similar coat coloration and the same haunting, pale turquoise eye color. We currently have six cats: Longshanks, Lily, and their four offspring, Rooster, Goose, Willow and Rowan. Rowan has a different daddy, a feral fellow we call Scrapiron. We haven't seen Scrap for over four months now. I'm a little worried about him.

And Parker has moved on to other spider adventures. She bailed on me sometime last Thursday, and is probably living in the parking garage at the hospital.