Garden Goodies

I wake up in the morning feeling the day stretching ahead of me--a day when OilMan is at work, and I am free to do as I like. I don't know how it happens, but almost as soon as I get up, I begin to feel myself playing catch-up. I thought I was late for class and raced into town, only to find myself one of the first people there.

I came home planning to resume my sewing/organization tasks of yesterday, but by the time I had gotten the laundry started, thrown some sticks for Ozzie, fiddled with plugging my iPod into our Bose radio speakers, (a 3 am brainstorm realized) hunted around for some music the teacher played in class this morning, and gotten some lunch, I decided I should do a little harvesting in the garden.

The zucchini hiding beneath the squash blossoms have a tendency to turn into monsters if left unattended for a few days, but if they are picked quite small they are delicious shaved and eaten raw in a salad. The string beans can go from bright green and delicious to woody and stringy if your head is turned away too long, but many of the just right ones were out of reach at the top of the beanpole. The eggplants shelter between incredibly sharp thorns, and the tomato branches are so loaded with tomatoes the they are starting to bend to the ground beneath their burden.

Perhaps a ratatouille with a tomatillo salsa tonight....

Just as I was thinking about heading back to the sewing table, Dana arrived with an offer I couldn't refuse. She would go to the store if I would make dinner for everybody with Peter.

Too bad I just went to the store, the clean laundry needs folding, and while we worked out the details of dinner, Rudy emptied all the wastebaskets onto the floor. Oh well, maybe tomorrow....