Mosaic Mom

The heat has thrown the gardening season off. The green beans I timed for Thanksgiving were ready yesterday.

I picked about 3 pounds of Early Contenders and Cherokee Wax. Also pulled in a few more cucumbers so I can make a batch or relish today.

The tomatoes might make it for addition to the salad bowl...or on a sandwich with leftover turkey and mayo. Yum!

A lady I know phoned me Thursday. She invited me to drop by the Mt Dora Plant Show.
There were 2 other errands I needed to do in Mt Dora, too, so I tried to go this morning.

I could hardly get into town because my route took me past 2 stops on the garden tour. It was worse than traffic jams in Athens Georgia on a football Saturday.

The first jam up was back near Elyssium sub division. The shoulders of the road were parked solid. Traffic was stopped dead in the road as drivers were either waiting to find a parking spot or trying to dodge pedestrians.

The second stop on the garden tour was off Clayton and again, traffic was at a halt. Not a cop in sight to help the flow either.

I finally made it downtown, thinking that there might be parking since everybody else was driving around to the gardens. Oh, so wrong.

I spent 35 minutes circling looking for a spot before giving up and going to Lowe’s Garden Center instead.

At Lowe’s I was disappointed to find lots of cabbage but not a single cauliflower. Grrr.
Their broccoli looked pitiful too, so I came home and planted more seeds.

I had planned to pick up a Pulse Magazine in Mt Dora. I still have not seen my friend’s article.

I also was going to check out getting a Segue Scooter for Plant Daddy for his birthday. The lady who phoned with the invitation had suggested that I could rent one for the day and check out the garden show and the scooter at the same time.

I was on 5th Ave right downtown when a geezer on a segue almost ran his contraption right into the side of my car! What the heck was he doing? He was trying to jay walk on the damn thing! Nargh! Scratch that idea.


What PD is NOT getting because I couldn’t find parking in Mt Dora!

The cucumbers needed transplanting.
I went to the bench in the greenhouse. I lifted one of the 5-inch pots with the 20 inch long vines.

“SNAP”

What a sickening sound. And yes, closer inspection revealed, I had broken the stem.

I took the other three to the garden and as I was sliding the last one into the hole and guiding it onto the trellis, “SNAP”. I broke another one!

Dammit! I needed those pickles.

I finished garden chores (including planting carrot and pea seeds) and came into the house to start cooking the eggplant. As I reached into the cabinet to fetch the rice, I slipped.

“KRACKLE”

What another sickening sound as thousands of grains vibrated across the linoleum. It took a half hour to vacuum the countertops and floor.

Tired from all these chores, I reached into the cabinet underneath the microwave and lifted a 2 liter bottle of Diet A&W Root Beer. I thought I’d give myself a little treat. I twisted the cap open.

“POP”

That root beer erupted 5 feet across the kitchen. Almost half that bottle ejected and three dish towels were needed to wipe up the root beer lake. I hadn’t shaken it up. I thought to write to A&W with complaint, but what would they do? Send me another exploso-bottle? Forget it.

Finally everything settled down, eggplant was marinating, kitchen floor was mopped, I begin to iron the laundry.

I turned on the TV. There was a mad gunman loose in Orlando. I immediately telephoned LME. She clicked on and without a hello said, “It isn’t me. I don’t go over in that part of downtown.”

“Ok. Love you, “I said.

Now that made it a perfect day.

The good news is Little Mind Escape came over today. We made noodle dough by hand. We made zucchini filling. We stuffed 41 raviolis. We froze them and split the loot.

The bad news was...that only used up ONE zucchini.

Good news: Plant Daddy and I ate zucchini fritters on Tuesday and steamed zucchini on Wednesday.
Bad news...it took us 2 days to eat one zucchini.

We love LME for taking 2 zucchinis with her when she left today.
The bad news...We still have 3 in the fridge.

Man o man we are full plenty with zucchini at the moment.

(I made 3 pints of strawberry jelly today too. It was a great kitchen day!)

My Jade plant spent the summer decorating the front porch.

But lately it’s been looking ratty. We’re not out on that porch now that the weather is cooler, so it doesn’t get looked at, fertilized, groomed, or watered. It had suffered a lot of leaf drop.

I decided to move it back to the greenhouse this morning. It’s a big boy plant, being a 7 year old specimen in a terracotta bowl, so safety first…

Step 1: Hunt up my little red wheel barrow.

I finally found it back in the Z shop…what were the boys doing with my little red wheel barrow?...anyway…on the trek back from the front porch, I almost ran over “Mini-Blackie” the black snake. He’s a cute little 20 inches.

“Mini” was focused on a lizard clinging to the side of the greenhouse. Neither was going to move. I was the one that had to go around…Grrr…But I accomplished moving the Jade plant despite the “Wild Kingdom” episode I had interrupted.

Later this afternoon, I decided to fetch oranges for the salad for dinner. I went through the same area and “Little-Blackie” was hunting lizards in the same area. “Little-Blackie” is about 30 inches.

It occurs to me I haven’t seen “Blackie” yet this season. Last year “Blackie” was over 4 feet long. He may be pushing 5 feet if he had a good summer.

I need to keep my eyes open!

Why is writing an article for a magazine just like making a mosaic?

Because everytime you think you have it done, you find a little bitty detail that has to be changed or added or fussed with.

Last time I forgot the "About the Author" section. This time, during my final edit this morning, Plant Daddy suggested moving the sequence of the text. He was right! Reads better now!

It's always something!
I'll spend the rest of the day just hanging around...like these plants...

Or maybe I'll run errands!!!

Boo!

Happy Halloween!

Why did I submit Drabble to a poetry competetion?

Why was I surprised to get a rejection notice?

Duh!


We were just falling asleep last night when the phone rang. Little Mind Escape was en route to home in a AAA tow truck. Her starter had been balky for a week and finally died at 1AM at a 7-11 in Lake Mary.

Bright and early this morning Plant Daddy got one more turn over out of the old starter then took it to Apopka for a repair and an all's well ending. The little Sentra is on the road again.

I had a table at the craft fair at Waterman Village today. Thank goodness it was an indoor event...the temps this afternoon were 91!

I usually don't sell a whole lot at craft fairs...people say "I can do that mosaic stuff at home". But I usually cover expenses. Today was just an indicator of the slow economy. People were not spending at all. I made a total of $2.00. Sigh!

But at least the organizers gave me a nice free lunch. A delicious ham and cheeze on a croissant with chips, cookies and a coke. Now that's what I call a good day.

Everything is packed into the toyota ready to go to the craft fair tomorrow, including these mosaic seed birdhouses...

It is record hot again today...we'll break above the 90 degree mark. The tomatoes in the garden were wilted just after lunch so I watered them. Also the beets and broccoli. If it doesn't cool soon the heat may be lethal to the peas.
On the radio, everyone's talking about moving to Tennessee to escape the furnace. I wish I could!