Cooking Watermelon

Hello,

After work I went to the Ely garden to be greeted by dead squash vines of all stripes. I did pick two butternut squash in spite of the small size and early time. Bugs were crawling all over one of them. I have not cut them yet because I cannot tell if they will be any good and I have other things to eat, including green beans, edamame, tomatoes, and cucumbers. Gardening is not over.

We have now picked three watermelons. All have been good. The one I picked yesterday was hot to the touch in the late afternoon sun. It was still hot when I took it out of the car at home. The watermelon was good even with that applied heat and small size.

I left two in the garden that are about the size of a large grapefruit. Tomorrow we will go pick them or I will if Leroy does not want to do that. It is also the day I will dig potatoes or Leroy will. We will check about picking some of the apples. I have picked some off of the ground and they are getting soft and mealy. Not so good for eating, but fine for applesauce.

Another woman told me she had apples and they were practically cooking on the tree because of the extreme heat and dryness. Generally I do not complain much about the weather, but I am now ready for cooler temps and refreshing rain.

I find it hard to be outside for a long time in these times. The humidity is so high that I notice the clothes take a long time to dry. I also feel tired, could that be the heat? I am glad to have air conditioning at work and at home. However when I notice that some of my neighbors do not have it I feel a little guilty. None of those people are elderly so I hope they are managing.

Paula

Late post

I had actually written the following post on August 26, but for some reason I had strange things happening on the laptop. I finally just turned it off after I saw the message that my control key was stuck on. There was not enough time to reboot so I just quit and went to work. The computer worked fine after it was turned back on. I suppose I made some key stroke that told that key to hold down and change almost everything I wanted to do. So here is my copy of the things I had written two days ago.

New TV and New Bike Helmet

Hello,

Both of these items are getting settled in our lives. The helmet has been worn to the grand opening of the new library, great facility. Leroy pronounced the helmet good with great air flow in the 90 degree heat.

The TV has been on more hours in two days, than we have had the TV on for a month or more. Leroy has spent hours fiddling with or playing with the remote, rabbit ears (Wondering if we should get a new antenna now.), and the possibilities. Besides that we have watched a DVD, Leroy watched two shows that probably equaled two hours, and I exercised with a DVD for 20 minutes. Are we going to become couch potatoes? I hope not.

The picture is great compared to what we had and the sound is ok. I keep talking about how good the picture is, but Leroy just says, “Hum.”

When I asked, “Are you impressed with this new tool?” Leroy just responded, “It is fine.” This is the guy I know who does not believe in the over use of superlatives. I suspect he is quite happy with it and would not return to the former state using the twenty year old TV that had been my mother’s.

Paula 

Just a quick note

Hello,

I picked another watermelon yesterday, smaller than the first, but still good. My garden landlord pronounced that first the best he had ever tasted. “I’m saving seeds,” I told him.

“I am too,” he said. Now there is an optimistic 93 year old. Way to live.

Leroy worked in the garden last night harvesting, green beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, soybeans, and general health.

Paula

Shopping

Hello,

Thursday evening Leroy and I had planned to watch a TV program. It came in but then disappeared in a spreadsheet of mismatched lines and intermittent sound. “Are you ready to get a new TV now?” Leroy demanded.

“Yes,” I replied.

Leroy leapt on that and scheduled a shopping, purchasing trip on Saturday morning. Saturday morning I was ready, but first I canned some bread and butter pickles as well as nine pints of green beans. Leroy helped me with all of that. A load of clothes was washed and hung out. I might even be relieved when winter comes and the garden is closed.

At the store whose TVs we have visited in the past, we bought a TV after we learned that we had some deals that went with it. The lure was strong making easy the decision to buy a 32 inch smart TV that is smarter than we are.

Leroy already knows a lot about it and I just let him have at it. I am not sure that I can access anything yet on my own. He was able to set up the WI-FI connection, but cannot seem to figure out how to browse the web as he does not know how to make the keyboard appear on the screen.

At least he was able to pull in a number of TV channels and we can watch a DVD. He just asked, “How did I get to that thing in the first place?”

Learning, learning, all the time there is learning.

Leroy needed a new bike helmet as his visor snapped off his as well as a small crack appeared. Before he fell he had been talking about getting a new one, but this cemented the idea. He is in good shape now with just a few small aches and pains.

Paula

How Did I Do It?

Hello,

As soon as Leroy left for work I headed to the community garden to pick edamame, picked a few, decided the rest needed to grow more,  and ended up picking green beans. The two green bean rows are quite long. After an hour there I realized I needed to go four blocks home to go to the bathroom. On the way I realized that it was a good thing I was doing this in two trips as the beans, zucchini, and summer squash weighed quite a bit. At home I called Leroy to remind him about the gas smell associated with the older car. I was only a block from home when Leroy called to ask me to take the car to the mechanic who would look at it right away.

True to his word he did indeed look at the car right away, declaring, “The O ring was the wrong one for the fuel injector and it was being eaten by the gas.” It took him a little while to get this taken care of.

I ate a snack at home, rested a very short time before starting on my second walk to the garden. The sun is not inclined to stay still; consequently my row was out of the cooling shade. But I picked those beans without grumbling much in my head. By the end I felt that I had accomplished something worthwhile as in a short day or two the beans would be over ripe.

Lunch was in order before I could face snipping off the ends of the beans and snapping them in at least three pieces. As I worked on them I realized that they were very nice beans and was grateful for the chance to have them. I had to find, gather, clean, and count jars. The large pressure cooker was easy to find, but harder to clean. Next time when we store it there will be some protection around it.

I expended a lot of nervous energy getting the beans in the quart jars as I anticipated the possible dangers of using the pressure cooker. Perhaps that would be fear and not nervous energy. At any rate it all went well. They were done before Leroy come home from work, but still in the cooker as it cooled. Did I mention that I was also making bread today? The kitchen was the hot place to be.

Paula

Leroy's ride

Hello,

Leroy had left for work, I settled in the living room to drink my tea, and shuffled my schedule around in my head when I heard the door being unlocked. “Why would he be back so soon?” I wondered as I called out hopefully, “Leroy?”

What would I have done if Leroy had not answered? I am not sure, but my heart would have had some serious trouble.

“Yes,” he answered and added as he came into view, “I flipped my bike.”

He looked very normal, but I asked, “Did you hurt your leg?” when I noticed a bit of limping.

I helped him clean his scraped leg, put on antibiotic cream followed by three large bandages. “I am so glad I was wearing a helmet as I bumped my head rather hard.” Leroy said.

“How did this happen?” I wanted to know.

“I was crossing the railroad tracks and a semi was coming. I did not pay enough attention to the road and got caught in the tracks.”

“Did the semi stop?” I wanted to know.

“Yes he stopped and asked if I was alright,” he replied.

Leroy then drove to work. Tonight he was tired and sore. I suspect he was in shock from the way he was acting this morning. He took a nap this evening and seems much better now.

Paula

Garden

Hello,

There are advantages and disadvantages to the gardens that we now participate in. I find the distance a bit of a drawback for each of them. One is only about four blocks, but that means hauling any equipment that I or Leroy might want to use there. But it is closer than twelve miles away. Because of that longer distance I generally only go there on the days I work or we might ride our bikes there on a Saturday. Consequently in this now dry summer it is difficult to water. I feel antsy when I do it at eight o’clock at night because I am ready to dash in, do some small care things, and go home. Watering takes a while. If it were in my back yard I could water while doing other things with my time.

Another disadvantage is that I do not give either garden the care that I might if it were in my yard. Leroy does go to the community each Monday night while I work. I envy him that time because he gets to spend time with neighbors and usually gets quite a lot done. Being tired after work is not conducive to staying and tending. Now it is quite dusky at eight so I am not able to see as well as I did in the past. I liked the mulberries, but I am grateful that their time is past. We still have some in the freezer so we can enjoy them for some time to come.

Another disadvantage is that no Swiss chard will be available for us to eat as the fall winds down. No way to protect it until the frost comes anyway. I will miss that. For some reason it did not sprout.

A big advantage to both gardens is that there is a lot of space, certainly many times the space that we used by the house. In the community garden they hauled in compost and the soil is great. At my other garden there has also been some composting so the results are good. Also neither place seems to have any large pests at the moment, just smaller squash bugs. Last night I picked a zucchini that was covered with bugs. I had forgotten my gloves and it almost grossed me out to swipe off bugs and to touch it. I figured Leroy would bring home zucchini from the community garden consequently I was quite happy to share it with our “garden landlord”. There was also one cucumber to share. He shared some jars with me, but I am beginning to wonder if I will find enough produce to put in them.

Paula