Vacation watering
I'll be going on vacation soon and I'm starting to worry about how to water my plants in this hot & humid weather. I'll be gone for 4 days which I think most of my flowering plants will do okay but the vegetables might not survive. I bought this drip watering device, which is basically a plastic bottle with some mechanism at the tip that will water plants up to two weeks. However I've put this up for a week already and I don't see the water level decreasing. Do you have any recommendations for vacation watering? I can't really ask my neighbors to water them for me because all my plants are on the deck and they would need to come into the house to get to them.
The Drip-It Pro... doesn't really do the job:
Cheap dirt
I was talking to my neighbor the other day and she told me her plants are doing really bad this year. She planted some Gernaiums and use Bacopa as a filler for her window box. I have been noticing her plants doing worst and worst every week but I was thinking she probably doesn't have time to do the the normal maintenance (watering, pruning, etc.). After talking to her, she told me the reason is because she used cheap dirt. She made up for it by adding fertilizer but the plants just never bloom and they look pathetic. Is it true that cheap dirt is bad compare to the brand name potting soil?
This is a picture of her plant that's not doing so good 
My new love – Succulents
I don't know why I didn't get any succulents this year but I'm starting to like them a lot. I like it because it's very low maintenance and it's heat & drought tolerant which means less watering. Going to the nursery is a dangerous event because I always come out of the nursery buying more stuff than I planned! I promised myself not to go back to the nursery after my garden shopping spree in spring. However I had an excuse this time, I needed to get the organic pest control solution. Guess what, I was right, I came out of the nursery with yet ANOTHER plant in my hands. I just couldn't resist, this plant was screaming "buy me, buy me!" 
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So here's 'Angelina' from Proven Winners. It's full sun, drought and heat tolerant spreading plant, which is perfect for my sunny deck.
