Holy Shit, Patio Furniture is Expensive

Just ordered eight new chairs, two ottomans, and one round dining table for the screened porch, and god damn that was pricy!  It was 70% off thanks to an end of season sale and it still cost more than my first car.

Sweet Revenge

One of my favorite things to do while weeding is to fling the weeds onto the sidewalk.  That way I get to enjoy watching them die as they get trampled over a few days.  It helps to have a lot of foot traffic.

Once the weeds have been reduced to dust, I sweep them up and put them into the compost.

This Week in Horrible Trees

Sometimes I really hate trees.  First, there's the worst &%@#ing tree on the planet, the seriously invasive hackberry.  Then there's the black walnut.  Forget about the fact that I have to protect my tomatoes and peppers from the juglone with expensive raised beds.  Forget about the fact that I just read that even if you cut down all the black walnuts in the vicinity the juglone will continue to infect your soil for years.  Just look at this hosta!  All my leafy, shade-loving, and black-walnut-toxicity tolerant plants look like they've been through the Blitz because it's a banner year for nuts.

Totally Useless Herbs

In the spring, when I'm filled with optimism about all the fabulous cooking I'm going to do with all the wonderful vegetables I'm going to grow, it's really easy to buy a bunch of different herbs that I have no idea how to use.  After all, they're only $2.69 each!  Of course, most of the summer it's hot, and who wants to cook elaborate and unfamiliar meals then?

Now that it's early fall it's time to face reality, and realize that there was never a chance in hell I was going to use Winter Savory, Summer Savory, or all that Marjoram that seemed like such a good idea months ago.

To be perfectly frank, I even grew way more basil than I needed.  It's possible that I'll make pesto with the woody shrubs my basil plants have become and freeze it to use all winter.  It's also possible that I'll finish cleaning out my closet, organize my files at work, and re-alphabetize the cd collection.  Possible, but not bloody likely.

Next spring I'm going to plant rosemary, thyme, parsley, no more than four five basil plants, and possibly a succession of cilantro, if I can keep it from going to seed for more than ten minutes.  Those are the herbs we really use, all the rest are just culinary porn.

Fall Gardening Slump

Well, it isn't really Fall, but I'm getting ready to start school again, so it seems like it.  My gardening mojo drops dramatically when I start thinking about work.  I have the best job in the world for gardening--summers off!--but I do get a bit distracted just when it's time to harvest and maybe do some cold season crop planting.  And forget about fall clean up!  That comes when I'm well into a frenzy of grading papers.  I just barely manage to shove a few bulbs haphazardly into the ground in late October, before I completely ignore the garden until May.

Jelly Bean Tomatoes

My jelly bean tomatoes are producing really well, although it would be a lot easier to harvest the ripest fruits if the whole plant hadn't fallen over, due to completely inadequate support.

This is clearly a complete disaster.  It's impossible to dig through the foliage trailing along the ground and find the tomatoes that are ready for eating and this entire area of the garden is full of chipmunks reveling in the jungle I've created for their convenience.

Okra Update

The okras are trickling in at a rate that makes them difficult to use (what does one do with three okras?).  For next year, I need to do a succession planting so that we get a series of the right size crops.  

In other okra news, I still don't like it very much.  However, I've suggested that my husband make his favorite okra recipe using the much less mucilaginous and much more delicious asparagus or zucchini, and he's willing to try it.