I'll take "Flotsam" for 1000, Alex

[honeywine01]

As I try to keep from scratching the "gotta go now" itch that has little to do with the actual events of my life and much to do with my own peculiar psychology I'm going to try to bang out some kind of update here.

• Life in the garden is slowing down, but it's far from over. While we've pulled the melons, the last of the snap pea vines and the broccoli-that-wouldn't-die, we have spinach sprouting and a fresh crop of beans coming in on the plants that I debated pulling out (so glad I decided against that). I picked more than a pound of beans last evening, and there should be at least that many more to pick in a couple days. We've had (and are still having) a really good crop of bell peppers. Among things to research this winter is how to better encourage ripening in bell peppers. I have a funny feeling I'm going to have tons of jalapenos left after the salsa making is all done. The zucchini has recovered well enough from powdery mildew to start producing fruit again. If only the tomatoes had recovered as well from the spotted leaf virus. Our yield is proving to be much smaller than we'd hoped, and the fruits of the varieties we've grown before are smaller than we're used to from those varieties. We've got a whole four fruits each of both sugar pumpkins and butternut squash, but the pumpkins are turning orange and the butternuts are turning creamy and the skin is hardening up. I picked our first butternut this past week. The basil is mostly done for, with none dried. That isn't heartbreaking as I have a very low opinion of dried basil anyway. I would have liked to have gotten some pesto in the freezer, though. Same thing with parsley. I don't really give a rat's ass for dried parsley, and I'm not sure I want to bother with freezing it when it can be bought year round quite reasonably. I'll probably pull and dried the rest of my herbs in the next week or so. I hope the lemon thyme keeps it's vibrant fragrance dried. My cilantro bolted quite some time ago and is now in the process of becoming coriander. I've got to check exactly when to harvest the seed heads.
• I just looked up here in my little glass box to see something you just don't see here everyday---horses being ridden up Drake Road. And now hundreds of walkers are filing past. Seriously. Hundreds and hundreds of people, a steady stream for the past ten minutes. I guess it's some type of fitness walk, from either the JCC or from Friendship Cirlce/The Shule. It takes some fitness to get up that hill between Maple Road and here.
• Events like this walk and the Maccabi Games that happened in August cause massive and scary congestion in that damned traffic circle down at Drake and Maple. Houses burn and people die when emergency vehicles can't get through.
• I imagine I'm going to run into some nasty congestion tomorrow, too. Obama is going to be visiting a school that is right on my commute route. I use this particular route for a couple reasons. One is construction of yet another of the damned traffic circles on my primary route, and the other reason in that's the way to the property where I swim.
• Yay! The clubhouse remodel is done and the indoor pool is open again (and teenagers are back in school) so I can swim again. I absolutely hate the locker room remodel. It's very pretty for brochures, but it's functionality sucks. They've pulled out the lockers, replacing it with half a dozen more decorative than useful hooks on the wall. The large mirror over the sinks has been replaced by an arrangement of variously sized round mirrors mounted on a black backing. I suppose it's supposed to remind one of bubbles (gee, isn't that toooooo cute), but good luck trying to actually see yourself if you aren't exactly the right height to look directly into one of them. There is no bench or chair. Appearance wise it's not a winner, either. The way that all the surfaces in the shower area are tiled in exactly the same tile gives the impression of a negative exposure image of the holodeck from Star Trek. It's actually a little disorienting, too. Still, I can't believe how incredibly good (and exhausting) it feels to finally get back in the pool---even if I now find it easier to change into my suit in the restroom before I leave work.
• I seriously need to get back into routine with both my swimming and the DASH plan. My summer of laziness and stress has both my weight and my blood pressure back to heights I can't let them remain at.
• I wasn't planning on doing any kind of preserving with peaches this year, but it looks like I'm going to have to. Since Paul was going to be on the side of town where the farmstand we buy our local produce from I asked him to buy some more peaches. The peaches this year have been incredible. I've eaten them every day for the past two or three weeks. I wanted to make sure I got a few more before peach season is over (which would be now). He bought a half bushel. I think I may try freezing them instead of canning them. My brother says he prefers them frozen. And frozen they don't require either syrup or juice, making them better for us. Hmmm. Since one of the things I've been doing with the peaches this year is trying to perfect a peach custard pie, I think I just killed the better-for-you argument with myself.
• We're headed out to Ann Arbor after I get off tonight to see Orpheum Bell at the Ark. Should be a good show. And yes, that undoubtedly means that dinner will be a fry up and hard ciders at Conor O'Neill's. Mmmmmm! Black Pudding here I come! One of these days we'll actually hit up one of the other dozens of great restaurants in Ann Arbor----and if you believe that I've got a piece of property I'd like to show you.....
• And finally, I saw this on the news this morning. Somebody be brave and give this one a try, eh?

Vanilla Beer Shake

12 oz your favorite beer
1 shot vanilla extract
1 can reddi whip
2 shots vanilla vodka
1 shot heavy cream

1. Pour beer in a 16 oz tampered beer glass, and add the vodka, extract and the heavy cream.
2. Top the glass with the reddi whip.