I won't talk about my birthday after this. Promise.

I know I promised to turn 29 forever every year just like every other newly 30 year old, but I'm just going to stop that charade right now.

I'm 30 and I've decided it doesn't suck. So why pretend to be 29, even though it was proven to be rad?

See - you know what I mean. You newly (and oldly) 30 year olds, you.

Plus, how cliche to be all Oh I'm 29 don't you know even though I'm so not 29 and even when I was 29 I felt like everyone thought I was 30 because of how everyone lies about this age so I kind of felt like saying I was 30 (or 25) even when I actually was 29 so people would believe me or at least not think me some sort of shallow liar.

Which I obviously am not because I didn't try to lie even though saying I was 25 had a nice little ring to it. From what I recall anyway. That was a while ago. Ahem.

So - 30 is AOK with me and let me share with you the festivities because they were festive and suitably sucked down a good week+ because I'm very self-involved and can't be satisfied with one single day for my birthday of all birthdays, no. A week or more will do nicely, thank you.



Clearly, there was drinking.

I think I've moved successfully into my Tanqueray 10 stage, although I still love Bombay Sapphire very much. Which is a good thing because a lot of the bastard bars around here don't have 10 on hand and that officially irritates me.

Also the fact that ZERO bars have Diet Tonic enrages me to no end, but it doesn't stop me from asking while I cross my fingers. And I'm such a spoiled little Do you have any Diet Tonic beotch that I have actually started just ordering it as a "Diet 10 and Tonic" which I think is the equivalent level of annoyingness to ordering a coffee at Starbucks using no less than 10 words that may or may not exist on the menu. At least given the way the bar whore looks at me when I ask this anyway.

I don't really drink coffee, so I don't know if all these words are necessary, but since I don't order my drinks with any manner of whip or sauce or nuts on top or frosting or half-caff anything, I might still be less annoying than those people. Or not. You decide.



And because we are who we are, and that is to say we are food-centric whores, there was some eating.

I mean really now, we ate a ton. Bubba and my friends and my neighbors and my family indulged my every food-related fantasy over the week or so that I claimed as My Birthday Now Let's Do What I Want.

My belly really ran the gamut from the best cupcakes to authentic German pretzels to melon fresh from my garden to fried artichokes to poleta with truffle sauce to roasted green beans to pizza to, well, you see. I ate everything. And I didn't even feel bad.

Now, though, I feel bad. In the I-have-made-PMS-worse kind of way. I won't go into details, but I try to be really good right before PMS happens so that I don't balloon into some sort of circus sideshow during My Monthly Time, but this month I was 100% bad and now I feel like I should be saddled up and ridden around.

Take a moment to imagine this. It's truly horrible.


And when I wasn't eating or drinking (there were times, yes), we did a lot of fun things and then I did some things that are only fun to me and a weird chosen few and then we did some things that shouldn't be fun for anyone, but I'll get to Pineapple Express in a minute.

One of my favorite things in the whole wide world is the beach. And my favorite thing in the whole wide world is my dog at the beach because she loves it more than I do which is barely possible unless you're a dog with a big smile like this one.

When we get to the beach and I have her sit before I take her leash off (because I'm a mean dog mommy) she looks at me like, Really!? I get to run around? Here? I WILL BURST LET ME OFF THIS FUCKING LEASH! but all while she sits there and smiles and stares at me and wags as hard as she can because she's about to burst. And then I take her off the leash and she runs off into the waves and up onto the rocks and back and forth and sometimes even after the ball I keep throwing (and retrieving myself because she could just give a shit about it) and looks to me exactly like what Happy would look like if it were a thing.

Which, if you're her, it is a thing. A beach thing.


And in the category of fun shit that I like to do, I did some canning and freezing for winter because I think I'm a homesteader or something equally ridiculous given that we live in northern California where there's no real winter to speak of and Trader Joe's is like right there, but whatever.

And in the category of shit no one should like to do, we went outside of our usual repertoire of weekend and/or birthday activities and went to the movies. Something about hoards of people sitting in a big dark room watching a loud film of questionable quality where they can freely chew and talk on their cell phones even though the big talking box of popcorn says not to just isn't our thing.

But there we were, on Monday, our blessed holiday day off, sitting in the theater suffering because of my poor judgment that decided we should go see Pineapple Express because I'd heard it was hysterical and oh you'll totally love this movie, it's so YOU.

Wrong.

I won't go into specifics, because you all can decide what you like and don't like and what makes you lose hope in the American film industry all by yourselves without my interference, but I will say that the fact that someone thought this movie was so me is just depressing and also wrong. At least from my POV.

Because, from the inside, I don't feel like a disjointed, pointless, unedited, sloppy waste of time, which is what this movie looked like to me. Although, hey, from the inside, this movie might feel more like an intelligent 30 year old with better things to do than stare at a mindless and unclever swear-fest while seated next to The World's Worst Father and his seven year old son who was quickly memorizing all the braindead lines in this shitshow.

And yes, I did criticize this movie for its swearing-ness. Which, I think you realize is really something coming from me. And also ironic, but that's not the point. I mean, maybe I was just infinitely aware of the toddler mimicking the dialogue next to me while his Bastard Father took a nap, but either way, this was an awful and painful waste of my holiday afternoon and I was only half way through the thing when I knew I'd be wishing for those hours of my life back.

And I liked Superbad and Grandma's Boy (loved) and Jackass Number Two and Borat and a million other so-called retarded movies, but I do believe even my standards are too high for this lameness.

We will probably never go to the movies again.

And because the theme of 30 should be AWESOME instead of horrible, as my last rant would insinuate, there were a few life changing-ish events that occurred during My Birthday Now Let's Do What I Want that I should address. Specifically those that have to do with riding a bike.

A bicycle bike.

Oh yes, let it be known that 30 is the year that I went back into the water with self-propelled wheels and *GASP* had fun. More on that soon.

And with that, let's end the I'm 30 talk.

It's September and people (assholes) keep saying "Fall" and football starts next weekend *pees pants* and my race is in less than a month *shits pants* and my best friend is coming for a long weekend soon and holy crap the tomato plants think they're going to produce a third crop for me. And OH MY HELL I am actually knitting something.

Oh, and don't forget to put your name in the hat for a Pickle Visit.

That's all the randomness I'm prepared to put out there today. You're free to go.

2 isn't enough [+ PIE]

Dudes.

For the last four years I've planted my yearly vegetable garden with two tomato plants. And then these two tomato plants have grown to gargantuan sizes and imposed their overabundance on us with unrelenting ferocity.

They taunt us, basically, and it gets out of hand.

And so, we've spent the last four years coming up with (delicious) ways to handle the burden oh what WILL we do of overly productive tomato plants so that we don't waste any so that I don't then have to throw myself headfirst off the roof.

I don't do waste.

Anyway.

I'm very proud of us now though because two tomato plants totally don't even scare us anymore. We don't even get all oh what will we do when the tomatoes start to ripen because we know exactly what we'll do. We'll consult The List (it's a mental mind list thing) and get to eating.

We have cultivated The List of Things We'll Make From The First Tomatoes over many cold tomato-less winters to the point where we know precisely the fate of every tomato that pops loose from the plants. It's very pre-meditated and we like it that way.

Some of the things from this list (because it's a mental mind list, some things might have been misplaced. It happens.) are:

Tomato sandwiches
BLTs
Canned tomatoes
The Best Tomato Sauce Ever. Yep.
Tomato Pesto Pie w/ Italian Sausage

And while we don't necessarily account for the tomatoes we'll eat freely from the plants when they're still warm from the summer sun, we expect to have those too, while also having plenty to hand out to coworkers and our nice neighbors. (Shitty neighbors get NONE.)

BUT, if this season is any gauge, two tomato plants is just not enough anymore. We've managed to mastermind the tomato season to the point where we've made all the things from The List and are ready to settle into casually tossing up a tomato salad or handing a bagful through the dutch gate except we've caught up to production.

WHAT?

That is correct. Our wintery masterplanning has resulted in an overly efficient consumption of tomatoes. Even after going on two summer vacations during which time we were convinced they'd all ripen and rot before we could enjoy them and thus be wasted *YIKES* we've managed to consume each tomato from the plants either with our own mouths or by giving them to the mouths of others leaving us with a lull between crops.

Usually I don't even notice this lull because I'm too busy sweating my life away in the kitchen canning the winter's supply of tomatoes and wondering why it doesn't even look like I made a dent in the plants, but this year I'm like hey, there's the lull, we're right in it and oh it isn't as fabulous as I'd imagined.

Anyway. The lull is here and we're waiting on about 6 orange-ish red-ish fruits to get the second wave started and I bet you're wondering why I brought you here if there aren't any tomatoes to talk about.

Well let me tell you. I brought you here to talk about the completion of The Tomato Eating List and more specifically the most recent addition to The List and then to show you pictures of this recent addition and to also declare that it's All Food in Pie Form time again at our house WOO!

So, the most recent addition to The List, after the crucial addition of crumbled Italian sausage, is Farmgirl's Savory Tomato Pesto Pie which we call The Best Tomato Pie Ever. Yep. because I'm not creative nor do I have the energy to invest in original names and once we added the Italian sausage to this otherwise quite delicious pie it became The Best in so many ways mostly because it now included meat and that is a bonus.

In order to honor this momentous occasion, I thought I'd walk you through A Day In the Life of The Best Tomato Pie Ever. Yep. so that you could see for yourself what a fucking weirdo I am and also better imagine how delicious this pie is so that you can make it for yourself.

I won't recount Farmgirl's recipe for you because, unlike every other recipe in the whole wide world, I barely fucked with it because it's perfect (except for the meatless part), so you can go over to her site which is awesome in and of itself and get the How-tos from the Farmgirl herself. If you want to make it MEATY you can add the following ingredient/step:

Ingredient: 4 Italian sausage links

Step: After making the pesto and before making the crust (OH MY HELL THE CRUST IS SO GOOD), crumble and brown the sausage in a pan. Set aside. When you go to compile the pie itself, just add crumbled sausage between the tomato and cheese layers *swoon*.

A Day In the Life of The Best Tomato Pie Ever. Yep.
Recipe by Farmgirl, see above notes for changes.

Early in the morning, or before getting lunch tacos whatever, go to a decent meat counter or butcher (We like Lunardi's for our meats) instead of the crappy grocery store and get some legit Italian sausage. Like this here:

And when you get this meat home, slice it out of its grody casing (I spared you the photographic evidence of the grodiness, don't you love me?) and crumble it in your newly unsticky pan with your $1 wooden spoon from Target like so:

Then go out to the garden and pick a bunch of tomatoes (I think I used about four or five) and a hooge bunch of basil and bring them in to slice and from which to make pesto, respectively:



Then recall briefly how it IS so worth it to make the biscuit crust (PEOPLE, THERE IS PARMESAN IN IT YUM) and then make it because it only takes a few minutes:



When you then roll it out, you can feel so proud. Plus you know it's going to be very good.


Once you have all your fillings ready, start by lining your pie pan with the larger crust (the eyefucking method works nicely when deciding which crust is larger. I find anyway.) and start by shmearing the first layer of pesto right on there with your teeny orange spatula from CB that you love. Or whatever:


Then crack into those tomato slices and layer them on top of the pesto without even feeling guilty about how many tomatoes you're using because OH it's so worth it:


Then AND THIS IS THE ONLY CHANGE I MAKE TO THE RECIPE SO WATCH OUT add a layer of your crumbly sausage yum:


Then put the cheese on there without even thinking about how much you're using. It's better than way:



Then try to shmear on some more pesto. Don't be concerned about how neat it is or if the cheese sticks to your spatula because it'll all melt together and be glorious very soon:


Then add more tomatoes because you're frivolous:


Then do the sausage again because it's there and brown and ready to go. Does that sound bad?:



Then more cheese. I doubt you need a reason to add more cheese:



Then put the other crust on top of the whole thing, thus concealing your gluttonous shame if only but for a short time. Also try not to tear it and then cut in some air holes so that your tomatoes don't suffocate:



When you take it out of the oven, it'll look something like this or maybe more brown because you're more patient than I am. Oh isn't everyone:


And then you eat:



And don't even feel ashamed for making sexy noises when you eat this pie because it is that good.

So good, in fact, that you'll totally not at all mind eating the rest of it as leftovers for the next three days. And also don't feel bad if you have leftovers that you end up freezing because I hear that it freezes beautifully. Not that I can confirm those rumors because we don't ever have any leftovers of this pie due to its awesomeness.

So now The List is complete and we're experiencing the lull between crops, but since it's supposed to warm up again this weekend, I'm hoping we'll get at least another pie out of the deal.

And then next year the plan is to double our tomato plants (we like Better Boy, but I won't judge you if you plant some fruity heirloom kind that looks like an anus) up to FOUR so that I can go back to freaking out about what will I do with all these tomatoes because that is the way I prefer to live my life, OK.

Happy Pie.

Yes. It IS nice.

Hi, nice oranges. I will pillage you now.

I know that the holidays are long gone, but I did some stuff during my time off that I want to tell you about, mostly so that I can show you pictures of my dog because she's adorable and I barely ever show pictures of the pets.

Also, I feel like I should show photographic proof that I appreciate AND take advantage of this glorious place in which I live because I'm getting reminded pretty regularly that "it must be nice" to live in a place where fresh produce just grows freely from the trees around my house at any old time of the year.

These reminders may have something to do with the fact that it's, like, 7 below zero across the better part of the Midwest and it's making people crabby and you don't soothe cold crabby people's nerves with pictures of sunny California and oranges, but whatever, this is my way.

I'll show you pictures and tell you a story about how I don't let any of it go to waste so everyone can just stop saying things like it must be nice to just go out in your flip-flops in January and pick an orange off your neighbor's tree because that is exactly what I did over the holidays. A lot. And it WAS nice, thanks for asking.

For the story, now. The one that will make you hate me either a lot more or maybe a little less or maybe it will just reinforce your current feelings about me which might also be nothing. I don't know - you have to tell me these things. But I won't change. I'll just know how you feel.

Whatever.

Once upon a time it was about three weeks ago and I had about 10 days off of work thanks to all these holidays and some saved up vacay time.

During these days I decided that I was going to indulge in all the things I like best by not trying to do them all at once. Instead, I was going to do only a few, or one, a day, so that I could really enjoy not having to rush through them because I have to go to work tomorrow and dinner's not going to cook itself and my Blackberry is going to explode if I don't check email.

So, like, one day I knit almost all day and a few days I cooked and baked and I went on a lot of nice long runs and went snowboarding and hung out with the dog and Bubba and every day I drank freshly squooze orange juice.

That's right. One of the things I love is freshly squooze orange juice. Especially when it comes from a friend's tree and when that tree is within walking distance to my house so that I can hike the dog over there and have her haul the oranges back in her dog pack.

For the record, this is not considered "dressing your dog". A practice that I do not condone.

I mean, hey, I like fresh juice, but I'm not carrying 10 lbs of oranges on MY back. What do I look like? The dog? Pffffft.

So, on a few occasions during my time off, I saddled the dog with her empty pack, walked over to my lovely friend's house (where I have an open invitation to pick fruit) and gently pillaged her orange and lemon trees.

And don't get all, are you sure that's good for the dog because she loves to have a job, this dog. And when I bring out the backpack and we get to walking or hiking, she becomes very focused and peaceful. At least, that's how I see it. Perhaps she is just cursing my name so severely that she doesn't have energy to lash out at every passing squirrel, but who knows. I choose to think she's Working by walking with the pack and that she likes working because it gives her a purpose beyond the slaying of every squirrel or field mouse. (Another story for another day. Ew.)

Jada's very serious about her role in the picking, too. She walks around the tree with me and lets me fill her pack up even before she tries to taunt my friend's kitties out from their hiding places with her woeful dog whining. Even though she loves kitties more than anything in the whole wide world, except maybe possums, and usually wants nothing more than to be left alone to chase them. Which we don't allow. Since we have a cat at home who should be allowed to live in a peaceful environment without the constant threat of chewing.

Mama, I'm full now and would like to go home to my squeeky gingerbread man.

Whatever. What I'm trying to say is that she's a very dedicated worker and no cats were harmed in the picking of this fruit.

Pre-squoozing

And after the picking of fruit and the returning home to find that I had the whole day ahead of me, I got out the juicer that I was sure was going to be a waste of money back when I impulsively purchased it, and squooze myself some juice.

Every day until the oranges were gone. And then I got some more and made more juice. And then I counted my blessings that I live in NorCal where citrus is ripe on street trees in January and that I have a dog that doubles as a pack mule.

I got this milk bottle for 25 cents at Goodwill. Don't tell anyone I use it for juice.

So, just go ahead and say it must be nice because it is and at least I am not the one around here that just lets their fruit fall on the ground for runners to slip on when they're out for their long run on Saturday mornings.

I mean, or whatever.

Do you smell that?

That burning smell? I can smell it. Yep - THAT.

Don't be alarmed - it's just my brain melting down. Because NaNoWriMo is really not going as smoothly as I previously and naively thought that it surely would.

Don't be confused by the word count you see in the sidebar - it may be in the 20Ks, but only two of those words make sense in their context, I'm sure of it.

I mean, I kinda knew I'd be in for some shit once I got through the honeymoon phase of the first few days - with my fresh new idea turning to molten crap right there on the screen in front of me, but I was really a whore about the whole thing in the beginning and was all up to my shoulders in that false sense of supremacy that can only come from someone who has never tried to write a novel.

I was all, Shit - I have this awesome, funny premise and a whole month to write about it, it's going to be kick ass! And, who are all these people complaining - how hard could this be? Losers.

Well, pee shaw - I am the loser now.

And why? Because all the shit that they talk about in the NaNo forums about characters becoming boring and plots losing steam and fingers bouncing off laptops while resulting in zero coherent words on the page are totally a reality in my life now.

And it's all because I never lost that "I am different and therefore will not experience the issues that normal people do due to my specialness" quality that has been a part of my psyche from the time when I was a small child.

Like, you know when you watch a movie and there's a smart girl and a not so smart girl or a powerful boss and a downtrodden assistant or a clever thief and a dumb sidekick or the hot chick and the ugly chick? Well, in my mind, I'm always the smart girl/powerful boss/clever thief/hot chick.

I would always just align myself with those characters even though, as I get older and (one would hope) wiser, I've realized that not only am I not the smart, powerful, clever hottest girl, but I'm not even in the movie. I'm not even in the best seat in the fucking movie theater and I paid $12 to get in here and am wearing jeans with a hole in the crotch and dirty flip-flops with a very old pedicure.

So, what I'm saying is that it has come to my attention that I've spent a lot of my life being very delusional about who and what I am, what I can and can not do (Kung Fu is a good example) and what I do and do not look like and despite that jarring realization and vague but lagging understanding, I still somehow didn't adequately prepare myself for NaNoWriMo, but instead allowed my brain to delude me into thinking that somehow this was going to be easy like Sunday morning even when other people were balancing on building ledges as the task approached.

This also explains why I still take pairs of size 6 jeans into the dressing room with me even though I haven't been a size 6 in jeans since my freshman year of college. So delusional.

What I should have been telling myself was, "Look, woman, it is very difficult to write a novel. That is why not everyone does this. And you are not a fucking superwoman who has unique ideas that no one else has thought of AND the talent to sit down at a computer and put them to the page in an amusing or even relatively meaningful manner. So get off your high horse and go write something for the blog because at least there you can yammer about things you know, like running slowly around the block and spending ridiculous amounts of time planting shit in the ground. Leave novel-writing to the professionals and just go write some bad words for the internet to read because that's where you really belong."

Also, "That Snuggie isn't attractive and might as well be a fucking muumuu for the amount of action you're going to get while wearing it."

It hasn't been a fun ride these last few days.

I've had to take a new tact with the book and this tact doesn't please me. It's basically the Just Write Some Disjointed Stories About Your Characters And Then Maybe Someday Come Back And String Them Together With Swears method and I'm not sure it's going to work out.

I'll say it - I'm tired of these characters. They're not fun enough. And I don't know how to make them fun. I'm tired of the storyline. It's not interesting enough and I don't know how to make it interesting. My original inspiration that flowed from my brain like wine (see, that doesn't even make sense) has abandoned me for other more hospitable accommodations. Like, perhaps inside the head of a person who knows how to write compelling fiction, for instance.

I'm pretty sure my muse took one look at the garbage I was putting down on the page and was like, pfffffffft - this a total waste of my time.

And you know what? I don't even blame her. I'd leave my mess of an imagination right now, too, if I could. Because when I start to try to imagine what should go on with my fucked up story and boring characters my mind inevitably wanders off and starts putting together outfits for events not happening until 2010 or starts flipping through seed catalogs I haven't even received yet. This mind of mine has already decided that it would rather grow some kind of cantaloupe rather than honeydew but it can't make the female lead in this story do anything more interesting that bounce her three boobs around while sprinting across traffic!

It's maddening!

Anyway, I told you all that to tell you this: I've been quiet on the blog this week because all of my extraneous brain power left after work has been fitfully squooze onto the surface of my NaNo novel, leaving precious little left to fill this blog or even scratch out an intelligible note to the cleaning lady about please don't clean the microwave anymore because we don't use it and you keep putting it back wrong so that it clunks around and scares the dog when I try to make popcorn.

So, in a way, I'm sort of doing you a favor by sparing you my mindless rambling and endless whining and pointless bitching because I bet that if I'd shared with you my irretrievable delusions of grandeur with regard to novel writing when I said something about doing NaNoWriMo last month, you'd have told me to stick with the blog and forget about things as grandiose as stringing together 50,000 sensical words in one month's time.

Feel free to give me a good old, "I told you so", now because I totally deserve it. For being such a pompus bitch about this whole NaNo thing, even if it was all just in my head and I never actually said to anyone, "What's the big deal? So you write a book. Big whoop." because that's totally what I was thinking.

More wrong than size 6 jeans or thinking that my new haircut is going to look as good on me as it did on Jennifer Aniston when she cut it short (not The "Jennifer" haircut - that I did not like) and hated it but I thought it was really cute and filed it away as a haircut I'd maybe get one day if I had the balls to cut my hair short.

Well, I cut it short alright, but it still looks way cuter on Jennifer than it does on me, which is obvious because HELLO she is who she is and I am not her. Which seems like something about which I'd have previously have been aware, but thanks to my amazing self-deluding powers, was totally NOT aware of.

Again, it's been a rough week, delusional-wise.

I think I'll go run around the block. Slowly.

The tattoo I'd get on my ass if I could get a tattoo, which I can't.

This is not the tattoo.

I like to brag about our neighbors because they are really the best ones a young ill-mannered couple could hope for and also because we spent some time with the worst neighbors a young couple could imagine back in the day and so I feel that we are due.

I'm sure you agree.

Also, these neighbors aren't racist assholes, so that helps.

Anyway, these awesome neighbors (who are different from the awesome neighbors who helped us schlep 3 cubic yards of dirt and mulch across the street and different still from the neighbors who gave us the best tomato cages in all the land) came by on Sunday with a surprise awesome gift.

They called this an "Apple-Warming Gift", as we have an apple tree, three years the junior of their apple tree, and ours has yet to produce a blossom.

Sure - it's only been in the ground for nary a year and we were assured that after a year of establishment we could hope for blossoms, but you know, the neighbors felt that an awesome surprise Apple-Warming Gift would help solidify our chances.

We're not too worried yet, because he's still in the 95% percentile for height, or whatever those measurements are that parents of human children use to rate their kids against other kids to decide if they're normal.

Guess what, folks - they're not! They're all backward! Aaahahah ahahhA HAHAHAH ahaha!

Kidding - I have no idea about these measurements and what they mean or don't mean about whether your child is a future idiot or will grow up to be a super scientist.

Anyway.

So, these nice neighbors just knocked on the door, just as normal as could be, and then proceeded to gift us the most amazing tool imaginable that I actually had imagined buying about a thousand times but could never rationalize because HELLO when am I going to need to peel, core and slice quite so many apples?

I should just tell you now that this amazing surprise gift was The Apple Machine.

Feel free to stand back to properly absorb its glory.

This is the most amazing and wonderful machine of which I am aware.

Seriously, now.

I even told Bubba that, had I somehow invented this machine before anyone else in 1864 (thank you, Google), I could immediately die and be happy and satisfied with my life because this thing is a work of pure genius and obviously something for which its inventor will be forever known, Mr David Harvey Goodell. Don't act like you don't have his name tattooed on your ass cheek because I know that you do.

And if you don't think so then I'll thank you to produce one single other invention that is more ingenius, clever, easy to use, easy to clean and so 100% god damned effective. Go ahead, try.

Here, let me save you the trouble - you're wrong. The Apple Machine is better.

I mean, obviously.

Perhaps I was so bowled over by The Apple Machine at this particular moment because as he stood there just handing this magic machine to me as though it was the most mundane thing in the whole wide world and he wasn't even sure we'd want it (WHATEVER GIVE IT!), I had a whole basket of apples just getting ready to up and die on me.

And you know I don't do waste. Noooooooo.

So, obviously, I thanked him profusely and asked on about his own The Apple Machine and the status of their 2009 Apple Crisis (their tree produces apples, on top of which some of their friends door ditched them a bushel of apples. Woe is them) and then he started to look worried, so I let him say his polite goodbyes and escape to the peace and tranquility and Finny-Free-ness of his own house.

Despite this man's utter and total niceness, I'm not sure he quite knows what to do with me and my cocktail tottering ways.

Anyway.

Upon his departure, I made haste to the kitchen - along the way grabbing all the apples I could carry and crying out to my Joy of Cooking book that it better gird its fucking loins because I was about to bake an apple pie for the first time in about five or so years and it was gonna be a good'un.

And, in case you can't tell, I've been rummaging around in my brain thanks to NaNoWriMo and it appears the drama and Crazy spilling out on those pages is now overflowing here. Sorry about that. Don't mind the mess.

Now, there are a few apple pie recipes in Joy, I believe they are distinguished with numbers like I and II and maybe even III, and I think I went with Apple Pie II, but I can't be certain. Basically, this is the recipe and it's unique (to my small world at least) because it calls for pre-cooking the filling rather than tossing up the apple chunks raw and throwing them and the crust in the oven for the first time together as a couple.

Seems sorta trashy doesn't it?

I thought so, so I went for the pre-cooking the filling method, which seemed more decent and restrained. And we all know how decent and restrained I am.

Shut-up, you whores, I am.

The important thing is that I got to prop up my beloved, stained copy of Joy and commence to coring, slicing and peeling of my apple pile in, like, two minutes flat, because the thing is nearly assembled and ready right there in the box.

Bless it - it doesn't even need to be plugged in. Which, obviously, since it was invented before people had two dozen three-pronged outlets in their kitchens. Or electricity in their houses. Or stilettos.

And don't you judge me - I need all of those outlets. For things. Important, electricity sucking things. Like giant food processors.

Whatever, I'm getting off track.

I'd be lying if I said this was the only picture I took of this process.

Basically, within five minutes of mounting this beauty to my countertop (also mercifully quick and effective), I had a bowl full of perfectly sliced, peeled and cored apples ready to pre-cook with some butter, sugar and cinnamon in the approved holy way.

Just look at that and try to tell me it's not amazing. JUST TRY IT, SUCKAH.

This went into the compost. To make my compost amazing.

And this went into the pie to make the pie amazing.

I think you see where this is all headed.

As though I have any fucking clue what approved holy ways really are.

And, to keep these lovers apart for just a skosh more time - to heighten the longing and desire, I can only assume - I was told by Joy to let the hot, sweet filling cool to room temp in a single layer on a sheet before pouring it into the bottom crust.

Yes, I believe I *have* heard of food porn before.

If that's not good old-fashioned proper etiquette, I just don't know what is.

Though, it's surely obvious that I have ZERO idea what proper etiquette might be. But you knew that.

Sadly, though, I didn't pay so much attention to the warning bells going off in my head as I wandered over to the sideboard to cheerfully (and naively) retrieve the apple pie crust cutter gifted to me by a certain awesome mama.

Looks pretty promising, though, doesn't it?

Now, mom, don't get me wrong, I appreciate the cuteness of this particular item, and while the cuteness has not waned for me, its effectiveness does not, how you say, put it up there in the ranks with The Apple Machine given its general ineffectiveness and ability to destroy a perfectly good pie dough.

I mean, it started off innocently enough - I was even so excited to use it that it was the third thing I grabbed after Joy and the apples - but sadly, it's true vision was not to be appreciated as I dutifully turned my perfect dough into a misshapen wad.

NOT TO FEAR, though - because it was salvageable. And some apples did make an appearance on the final product.

Just not in the way I'd originally envisioned.

And after it baked, it looked as cute and chaste as could be. For a whoring apple pie, that is.

COVER YOURSELF!

Now, sadly, Bubba and I are still at odds over whether to deliver a thick slice of this pie to our Apple-Warming neighbors or wait until I bake another apple-something just especially for them (which could happen soon since the farmshare says we're getting apples again this week).

We probably shouldn't be having this conversation while eating the pie from the dish with one fork and his germs spewing everywhere (he has a cold) because the thought of giving them this germ-soaked masterpiece would probably feel more like a slap in the face than a proper thank you.

So, that seals it, I bake them something anew and won't let Bubba breathe near it.

Done. No repenting necessary.

Corn, GPS - it's about the same.

I was going to get into some more of the, ahem, New Fun Things with my Garmin, but, alas, I just realized that I need to also download some more software to this machine (a PC, versus my Mac at home) and then download some crap from the USB stick and then sync it with my watch before I could share the more riveting of the details, so the watch update will have to wait.

Until I can summon the patience to get all my machines on the same page with the stick and the watch and the stars and call up a few miracles, etc.

Don't be discouraged or put off by the Garmin yet, though - I've run across some decent features and seen some fancy ass shit that I think you'll like, too. If you have the patience for all this. Or if you're like me and don't like to be bossed around by technology and forge ahead if only for the sole purpose of Principle and Not Letting the Machines Win, etc.

For now though, let's talk garden.

Specifically, CORN.

Dead corn.

As in, it's gone.

Gone corn.

That's right, friends, I took down the corn over the long weekend and WHOA did it take more time than I expected.

See, when it comes to the garden, I usually allot way more time than is necessary to do simple tasks like planting seeds or harvesting tomatoes. I think this is because I love these tasks and in my mind I want to spend the whole live long day out there doing it because I know the results will be lovely and enjoyable and I want to do all I can to make these garden-type things come true, faster.

Well, I had the same vision for the corn: that I'd probably set aside way too much time to do something that'd take me all of ten minutes and then I'd be left going what do I do with all my free time NOW which did not happen.

No, not only did it take me approximately 10x longer to pull the corn, turn the bed and cover it until the first full moon of October (I'll get to this), but it also wasn't nearly as enjoyable as, say, planting the corn seed had been. Or, to be honest, any other garden task save for The Science which always takes just as long and is as mind-numbing as I expect it to be.

I'm not good with math, folks, and doing it under the blazing sun doesn't make it more fun.

No. Pulling the corn and going through this process was sweaty, dirty, monotonous work that basically sealed the deal on maybe I'll grow another variety of corn next year.

It was, all told, something of a pain in my ass, and then it filled the whole yard waste bin so that if I'd had any designs on, say, mowing the lawn, pruning the tomatoes (and lordie do they need it) or taking down any other crops, I'd have had to move to the Pile Method, which is fine except it means a lot of hauling that is no fun to do when I'm already hot and sweaty and have that ankle ring of dirt that comes from standing in a heap of downed corn stalks without wearing proper socks.

So, to sum it up, taking down the corn, a single and benign looking entry on my To-Do list, turned out to be a boring and bleh process in the grand scheme of gardening.

HOWEVER - I did get to take some pride in how my little formerly crushed by a mysterious animal corn seedlings had grown into big, strong and could-be-made-into-a-sukkah-if-I-were-a-good-and-real-Jew plants which produced enough corn for us to have more than one Corn Feast.

We could have been a sturdy structure.

Even though the longer they stayed on the plants, the starchier and less edible they became.

So small and starchy. Cute.

At least, though, the little cobs I found while Taking Down were cute enough to warrant an, "Aw!" from Bubba who was busy preparing himself for a crawl under our house.

Ew.

I definitely had a better deal with the corn chore. At least I wouldn't be blowing basement dirt out of my nose all weekend. CAN YOU SAY GROSS? GOOD.

Not that he looks gross, mind you.

Because I find him to be quite adorable in his coveralls.

Before he goes into the basement.

So you know, the corn is now "down" and in the process of "downing" all the corn, I also removed every leaf from every stalk to use as mulch for the bed while it rests and awaits its turning and planting with fava beans.

Hi, tedious.

Whether using the corn's own foliage to mulch the bed is advisable, I'm not sure, but it's hard for me to let any viable composting matter go into the yard waste bin without at least one round as mulch.

Although I was totally imagining the possible results I'd get if I'd dared to stop what I was doing (HA! FAT CHANCE!) to Google "mulch with corn foliage" because I *just knew* it'd return something like, "Your garden will be rendered inert for the rest of its days." or something similarly dreadful. Thankfully, I just ran that search and it returned nothing of use. Mostly how to mulch corn plants, nothing about the corn's foliage.

So we're safe! Relief!

Notice I didn't mention any additional searches. Yes, that is because I don't want to be pushing my luck. You understand.

Now, getting back to that "plant fava beans at the first full moon of October" thing...

My neighbor, of Tomato Tunnel fame, planted fava beans last year as she does every year - at the first full moon of October, and last year I joined the fava ranks and planted some myself to rehab one of my nitrogen-dry beds - but I planted later in the year at a random time that coincided with some phase of the moon totally unknown to me.

Well, hers grew about twice as tall as mine.

SADNESS.

I mean, mine weren't total slouches, but if you were to, say, turn 180 degrees and peer through the gate, you'd have seen her favas just all held upright and proud with stakes and string because WHOA they were hugely tall.

Meanwhile, mine were just fine standing upright on their own because, oh well, they were only so tall.

Well, not this year, folks.

With the corn down and the bed sitting idle under its mulch of the same origin, I am patiently awaiting the arrival of October's first full moon (10/4) to plant my new heirloom favas which I hope will grow tall and happy and make me feel justified in following moon phase planting even though when I told Bubba that's what I was doing he rolled his eyes in a serious way.

For the record though, I know other experienced and well-regarded gardeners who plant by the moon phases, so I don't feel too eye-rolly, but still, Bubba doesn't believe in this method yet and so I'm prepared to test it out and await general consensus on its relative ridiculousness.

We'll see.

Meanwhile though, I've let the artichokes go to flower because they look groovy and also because I'm lazy and our crisper is full from the farm share.

Neato.

And if you're one to follow trackers, you might be interested to know that I'm up to 188+ lbs of produce which comes out to a rough value of $710.25 harvested from the garden this year.

Because I'm nice, I'll do the math and tell you the value of that is under $.50/lb, which is cheeeeeeeeeeeap.

We're not done yet, though, as the tomatoes, beans and WHOOPSY cucumbers are still producing. Even if I don't realize they have ripe fruit until I go to pick beans and find cucumbers climbing up the inside of the tepee.

Or whatever.

Adopt a Crop update: I'm a cheater + Big Moment

As you may recall, I had to do a second sowing of the corn seeds because, well, the first sowing was more of a serving than anything else. A snack size serving for, what I now believe to be, a very annoying raccoon.

I think, at last count, with the two sowings under the protective cover of the Supah Technical frost cages, I was up to 17 germinated seeds. Of 27. That's not too bad, but with corn, you really need all the rows full and accounted for, otherwise there can be pollination problems and other mysteries that exist with corn and about which I'm totally ignorant.

Blissfully so, I might add.

So, still wanting to have a full house of corn but not wanting to roll the dice on more seeds, I went the Big Fat Cheater route and bought some corn seedlings at the nursery while my mom picked out her Mother's Day squashes. Nothing says, "Thanks for not killing me during my terrifying teenage years!" like an eight ball squash, I say. Thankfully, the nursery had Silver Queen seedlings, and so I didn't have to cheat AND compromise - that would have been awful.

Can you imagine? Let's not.

Anyway, I planted the corn seedlings yesterday afternoon and then spent some quality time admiring how the bed no longer looked like a balding middle-aged man anymore. Yay! No corn comb-overs!

Don't my plugs look natural?

And then this morning I went out to do some more Not a Bald Dude Corn Bed admiring only to find that a Bastard Raccoon had spent some clandestine moments tromping through the bed crushing everything in sight while surreptitiously dropping a load over the edge right into my path.

THANKS, ASSHOLE.

So, sadly, I had to do some propping up of remaining plants this morning and will have to go back to the nursery to fill in the holes he left with his giant STUPID JERKOFF paws/ass/tail. And then I had to get out the shovel to deal with the special coiled pressie he left steaming and collecting flies in my garden path.

*sigh* If only we embraced firearms in this house...

In happier news, he was a lazy raccoon and stuck to the thoroughfare, not meandering into any of my other beds to, say, take a nap in the lettuce or climb around on the bean lines. If that were the case, I'd be writing this post from the loony bin because that kind of scenario would get my brain to snappin'. Or I'd be up on charges for discharging a firearm in a residential area. Not that I own a gun, but still Crazy makes you do things...

Hey! Speaking of those plants I love with insane devotion:

You just try to tell me this doesn't warrant a crime of passion.

I brought in the third lettuce harvest already last night. Lettuce = Teacher's Pet.

And don't you fear, my chickens, the Adopted Crop of Lemon Cucumbers is alive and well over there away from the Hwy 101 of veg beds.

I predict that soon there will be photos of cucumber blossoms right...here -----> X.

I opted to put cages up around them this morning in case the Bastard Raccoon decides to make a reappearance and also because, with four seedlings per mound (there are two), growing at the rate they're maintaining, those leaves are starting to need some support. So, support I will.

*Patience*

In other FABULOUS AND EARLY news, we have our first tomato.

That's all I'm going to say. I don't want to clutter this perfect moment with a lot of chatter.

Go on, then, just relish the moment with me...

Reeeeeliiiiishhhhh iiiiiiiit...

Ok, I'm back. Isn't he huge and buttcheek-ish? I'm in love. The thing is the size of a marble. I'm thinking he might be the biggest Better Boy to grace my yard ever, but we'll see. No pressure or anything.

Oh, and lest I forget everything else in light of this beautiful buttcheek tomato, we also have ripening cherries,

Bubba tasted one and says they're still too sour.

artichokes,

I'm eating four for dinner tonight. You know, just to prepare.

and the tiniest hope of cilantro. Guess those seeds were a mite old. Oh well. It'll bolt in, like, three minutes anyway, so I'm not sure why I bother at all.

It might be bolting right now.

Also under the header of, Why Do I Bother, the last bed of tomatoes and basil looks like hot crap. Something's chewing on all of them and they aren't really growing. So, while I technically have four tomato plants and a dozen basils in the ground, I *really* have two tomato plants and six basils growing. The rest are busy sucking wind over there where I suspect they don't get enough sun and/or the "Bug Buffet" sign is drawing too much attention.

The sunlight may be the reason that the lettuce did great here last year, but not so much with the tomatoes. Sad.

For comparison's sake, see I'm The Mightiest Tomato Plant in All the Land, here:

I'm sitting on a nuclear waste site. Don't tell.

And, I guess, that's all the updating I'm ready to do right now. But I do have a recipe to share with y'all soon that'll take care of some of those greens (collard, chard, kale, totsoi, etc), let you play with your pasta machine AND include bacon. It's purty good. And if I hadn't had pupusas and beans for breakfast this morning (technically it was 10:30, so is that even breakfast?) I'd be eating those leftovers right now.

Instead, I'm going to be full until lunch tomorrow.