#1 Tomato Day

OK, that's probably the worst photo I've taken of #1 Tomato Day, but we're frankly all pretty lucky that a photo was even taken because this handful went right into my mouth after the shutter went off.

And by "shutter", I mean that stupid touchscreen button on the phone.

I know I should stop taking photos with my phone but, alas, this is my life now. Where my phone is never more than a butt cheek away. Because it lives in my back pocket, not because I put it in my ass.

WHERE ARE YOUR MINDS RIGHT NOW? Gross.

Anyway - it's #1 Tomato Day (plus also #s 2 and 3 if you're counting up there) and YAY. Also yay for the constant tomato stalking proving to be worthwhile rather than just a torturous pointless wander through the garden around the many piles that Jada lays out for me on an hourly basis.

Quiet thank you to the scooper for keeping me arm's distance from the piles and the ironic "Yard Dumps" bucket for keeping me from having to walk aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaall the way to the front of the property to dispose of the piles individually in the big can.

And I'm sorry for talking about dog poos when there are way better things like the coming of the next tomatoes and the rest of the garden's thorough insanity to saturate our minds and eyeballs.

Let's do that then:

TWO Better Boys just thisclose to face-stuffing ripeness

The fabled Paul Robeson with its alleged smoky flavor. We'll just see about that WHENEVER YOU DECIDE TO RIPEN, JERK.

The glorious Jaune Flamme. I shall eat thee in two bites.

Yeah, so the tomatoes are nearly upon us. Which is sort of scary given that we've already been set upon by the cucumbers and THE BIGGEST TOMATILLOS THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN.

Um, since when are tomatillos the size of tomatoes?

I'm truly in awe (and terrified by) the fucking huge tomatillos the garden produced this year. I got the seeds anew and started them in The Suspicious Grow Op and really didn't think that they'd do much and then they did MUCH MORE.

Hello and...

...WHAT IN THE SWEET FUCK?!

Yeah. Never in my life did I think I'd have a tomatillo situation like this. Where the plants are bigger than tomato plants and the fruits are bigger than tomato fruits and the plants themselves (because always two, remember?) have the capacity to overtake an entire raised bed plus snuff out most of the nasturtium around them.

Just yikes.

So, there's that.

Oh  yeah, the cucumbers are also yikes.

DONG

But also cute.

And handily hanging from its trellis like a good little dong.

And being all photogenic.

And prepping for pickling

And getting in the jar like a good bunch of pickles.

People, I've made so many pickles. We are never going to deflate as human beings around here.

So...swollen...with...pickling salt...IT'S GLORIOUS.

But oh, the other scary thing is the basil. There's...a lot of it.

And then, because I'm the basil grower on campus now and OOPS I overseeded my trays the last few weeks during the transition to pak choi so had a plants left over, I now have 50 more basil plants all over the place.

Good thinking, me.

*Sigh* I don't learn.

But I do eat basil at every meal now, so there's that.

And now I eat eggs, thanks to my ladies down the block that let me snatch their goods whenever I want them.

Thanks, Bitsy. Your fluffy butt is my favorite.

And now that we've started to go down the rabbit hole of photos with captions with photos, let's just look at my hops because they're fucking glorious.

I'll be getting in there with my macro lens soon enough so that you can see the gorge lupulin just aformin' under those petals. And then there will be harvesting, drying and finally BEERS.

Firstly, though - peel me a fucking grape already three years later.

Yeah. These fuckers are on their third year and are just now producing edible clusters that I would like to consume in one sitting, but alas, they ripen one effing grape at a time, so I have to wait.

Or, I have to eat them one at a time as they come ripe therefore dooming myself to an unsatisfying non-feast until such time as they produce enough so that I can't keep up with their ripening.

Like the apples now do.

One harvest out of three and we're already behind eating these.

So yeah, that's my big problem right now - eating all of this gorgeous shit that I'm so hot to grow. And it's my favorite problem to have.

WOE IS ME I'M SO HUNGRY. Oh. There's something to eat everywhere I look.

Good job, summer garden. And way to go me for writing the most disjointed post in the history of this blog.

*High five*