Good news for y’all is that the book has been updated and is, yes, better than ever:

“All New Square Foot Gardening” helps you grow vegetables in small spaces — and with small amounts of work.

The key is planting everything in square-foot spaces so you can really focus on your plants and keep the garden properly weeded.

My other favorite gardening book, which is more philosophical than how-to practical is “The One-Straw Revolution: An Introduction to Natural Farming,” by Masanobu Fukuoka, which is thankfully back in print after too many years. It’s another book that favors the minimalist approach, including letting the weeds grow and/or stepping on them. It’s not a “this is how to get the best tomatoes” kind of thing but is a very worthwhile read that brings together working the land and a Zen sensibility.

I should also mention for those in the San Fernando Valley who don’t have space for their own garden can “rent” space at the Sepulveda Garden Center in the Encino-adjacent portion of the Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area.

We used to have a couple of plots there. Cost is $8 to start and $20 per YEAR for a plot. We did it for a year but found it hard to make it over there often enough. That and the rats were eating all my tomatoes … but it’s really better than all of that. At the very least, it’s a nice place to visit. Just drive over (it’s near Havenhurst Ave., just south of Burbank Blvd.) and check out all the cool garden plots and kibbitz the other gardeners. If you think you can be there often enough to maintain your garden, it’s a great deal.

As for me, I do a little growing in pots right now — tomatoes mostly, and eventually I’ll do more, I figure. I have “Incredible Vegetables from Self-Watering Containers: Using Ed’s Amazing POTS System” somewhere in my piles of junk, but I can’t exactly find it at the moment …