What's Still Green in your Yard?

Man, I wish I could get out and dig in the dirt. It feels like August, my poor garden. I've spent the last few weeks removing a monster amount of cactus and being torn to shreds in the process. The mountain o'mulch has been spread and I'm waiting for my rock to be delivered for the dry ditch of a swale in the front and back yards. Out of sympathy for the birds, I've given up the fight for pathetic tiny tomatoes and am just hoping that my new babies will make it through.
I remember feeling the same way in winter in Alaska when I was a kid, staring out at the snow wishing I could just walk freely down to the beach. Instead, I'd sit inside where the temperature was stable, knowing it would be months before that was possible. The summer here is like my winters in Alaska...sans water. Usually the urge to travel and escape this heat would come just before Autumn (like hoping a plane to Hawaii in January ) but now, well it's everyday...the fear is that if I do go, what will happen to my yard...will firecrackers send it up in flames over the 4th? Will a careless smoker touch it off like my first summer in Santa Barbara? The recent National Geographic episode on global warming suggested that this part of the country will become a dust bowl...become? This howling wind is driving me mad...I'm about ready to strip down and beg for rain, I'm afraid my whirling dervish dancing might start a dirt devil...plus I'm just too damn hot to move. Need beer, or Margaritas.

Hang in there!