Grocery Shopping and Heat Waves

Life is like waiting in line at the grocery store. You wait, you slowly move forward, you pay the price, then you exit unsatisfied and broke.
— Erin McCarthy

You know what one of my pet peeves is? Grocery shopping.

I didn’t much like it before the pandemic, really didn’t like it during the pandemic, and still don’t enjoy it much now that things have opened up a bit more.

I mean think about it. You go to the store, put everything on your list into your cart, take it out of your cart to pay for it, bag it up to put back in your cart – and there always seems to be more after you’ve bagged it so you end up having to stack the bags or carry one – then load it into your car, drive home, take the bags into the house, then unbag everything to put it away.

There’s gotta be an easier way. And no, having groceries delivered isn’t the answer. I like specific brands, and I’m not about to trust someone else to pick out my produce.

And while we’re on the subject of produce . . . the yellow beans have pretty much run their course, I’m letting the few that are left ripen into seeds for next year (in other words, I’m tired of picking them) but the green beans are just getting started.

My neighbour was away for the weekend and I almost picked the ones on her side of the fence (the friend who was looking after things for her told me she wasn’t going to) but my basket was overflowing as it was. And I’ll probably have to go pick more today – I think I need a bigger basket.

Meanwhile, the bumper crop of green cherry/grape tomatoes is starting to ripen. Holy smokes that’s a lot of tomatoes! And meanwhile, the neighbour’s cucumbers have started to appear on my doorstep (she’s sneaky like that). I need to dig out my uncle’s recipe for icicle pickles, as I recall they’re made with full sized cucumbers (cut up) and not the small ones.

Oh! And I got some really nice looking kale from another neighbour that I’m going to try making kale chips out of. Have I mentioned what a friendly neighbourhood we live in? Quiet too, for the most part.

I think the weather has a lot to do with the abundance in our gardens. First we had a lot of rain, then we had a lot of heat – gardens like that sort of thing even if we don’t. Now it’s kind of a mixed bag of heat and rain.

Last week we had one day that was so humid that the windows fogged up on the outside. I used a squeegee on the deck door so I could see. Hey, at least the glass is clean now. LOL But we never got the major storms they kept promising. There were storms all around us, but we barely got anything.

It was so hot last week that even the daughter came swimming with the grandbaby and me. The only problem was the pool was so warm it wasn’t really refreshing.

I’m really hoping that the storms they’re predicting for this week don’t pan out either, especially the rain we’re supposed to get on Thursday. Thursday the Habitat For Humanity ReStore people are coming to pick up our old couch set and they want it sitting on the front porch. Then the Brick is bringing our new couch set and I’d really rather it not get rained on.

So cross your fingers that once again the weatherman is wrong. I know I will be.

Mundify Monday

mundify ~ to cleanse; to purify; to heal

The beans and peas are loving the heat wave we’ve been having, the tomatoes . . . not so much. The tomatoes in the garden are getting flowers, but then the flowers dry up and fall off. I have one beefsteak tomato starting, but so far the heritage Brandywines have nothing but dead flowers.

The peppers are still alive, and a couple of them are thinking about getting blossoms, but so far not much action with them. The beets are doing well, and so far I have just one pumpkin starting. All those blossoms and most of them just fall off (or get nibbled off by a forest creature) without the fruit starting below it. The carrots need to be thinned . . . if I could get at them. They’re sandwiched in between the rows of beans so you can’t even see them.

I’ve had to pick beans a couple of times already, and the peas once. That green thing outside of the basket is from my neighbor’s garden. It’s supposed to be an acorn squash but it looks more like a weird shaped zucchini to me. Guess I’ll find out what it is when I cut it apart to spiralize. Zucchini or squash, either way it’s going to end up as noodles for spaghetti.

The tomatoes on the deck, however, are starting to show promise. I have a few cherry tomatoes and several beefsteaks that I’m babying along.

Not only does the deck get more shade, it’s right off the house so the squirrels and chipmunks aren’t as apt to bother the plants on it. But if these plants live up to their promise, I’m skipping the other garden centers next year and going straight to Walmart for my plants.

The last couple of years we planted our own seeds for the cherry tomatoes but this year my neighbour gave us some she’d started inside. They’re doing okay, but they’re not as prolific as the ones we’ve had before. It could be the excessive heat, or it could just be the seeds she used. I’m very pleased with the beefsteak tomatoes though, especially since the brandywines she gave us aren’t doing well. But then neither are hers.

She has a huge garden and not only are her tomatoes not doing much (yet), neither are her beans. Usually by this time of the summer she’s at our door once or twice a week with beans and cucumbers to share. This year the only thing that’s doing well for her is the leaf lettuce and cabbage (which is also quite yummy). In fact, this year I got to share my beans with her.

You just never know what will do well in a garden.

Multivocal Monday

multivocal ~ having many meanings

Wow, summer didn’t just return, it returned with a vengeance! We’ve had heat warnings in effect for the last several days and we’re not out of the woods yet. But the weather network swears it’ll cool again by the weekend, and you know we can all trust the weather network.

No progress to report on the great office switcheroo. I did go back to Primitive Designs to look at knobs for the desk, but the ones I really liked they only had three of and I need at least six of them. Eight would be better. But they’re supposed to be getting more in this week so I’ll try again on the weekend.

Meanwhile, there’s still a lot of work to be done in the room itself before it can become my office. Specifically, I need to re-home the kitty litter pan. It sits right in front of the closet door, which is unhandy to begin with, and when one of the cats decides to drop a stink bomb in it, it can become lethal.

Smell aside, it would be nice to have easier access to that closet. It’s small, but deep, and although I have a lot of art supplies in there, there’s still lots of room for storage. I’ve got some plastic file boxes with old/little used files in them. And maybe I could even find room for some of the craft closet overflow. My idea is to have the craft closet for fabric and yarn crafts only, and all other crafts could go in the “art” closet. Guess I’ll have to wait and see how much room I have when I can actually get into the art closet.

I made another pass at the bookcase we want to get rid of, and found two more boxes of books to get rid of. Imagine, me getting rid of books! This time I took them to a used bookstore the next town over where I earned $15 in store credit ... which I turned around and spent $12 of on books for the grandbaby. LOL

Saturday night I participated in a somewhat unusual event. I’m sure most people have been invited to a high school or college reunion at one time or another, but how many of you have ever been to a grade school reunion? Here’s the original class picture:

You can click on it to make it bigger. And here are the 15 of us who were able to make it, plus our teacher:

15 out of a class of 36 is not bad, considering how much time has gone by. There were a few others that would have liked to make it, but either had distance issues or other commitments. Maybe next time guys. ;-) The organizers - Anne Reyns, David Cromlish, and Jane Barlow-Carrie - did an amazing job of tracking people down.

It was great to see everyone and catch up. A few people were easy to recognize but a few took some serious guesswork and many hints. And man, did the stories flow fast and furious, everyone had at least one. The more we talked, the more we remembered. I think it’s safe to say a good time was had by all.

I only thought to exchange e-mails with one of my old friends and silly me, I have a whole box of business cards sitting on my desk and do you think I remembered to bring any of them? Of course not!

Now that we’ve all connected, I’m sure it’ll be easier to stay in touch. I’ve already found five of my old friends on Facebook and I’m sure more will follow. Not everyone has Facebook though, so staying in touch might be tricky. But I’m confident we’ll manage somehow.

You know, sometimes the most pleasant walk of all is one down memory lane.