kiya

I can't remember if I've posted any of this before and am too lazy to look back.

I experimented this year with putting in some "winter crops" with variable success. Cabbage probably needed to be planted earlier because one of the varieties is bolting and the other, though not bolting, looks unlikely to set heads. The edible pod peas are doing ok, in part I suspect because I planted them next to the fence, so they aren't getting excessive sun. I harvested a handful of pods today and suspect I can get a handful per week until they give up. The third experiment was some mixed greens (NOT KALE) recommended by the nursery salesperson. I pulled them out when they started to bolt and will do something with them this week.

Because I had to trim some overly enthusiastic grape tendrils, I picked off the leaves, parboiled them, and made dolmas. Very successful (except for not rinsing the rice sufficiently, so the filling is a bit too sticky). Since I had more filling than grape leaves, I pulled some of the bolting cabbage and did cabbage rolls. (The dolmas cooked in broth and lemon juice while the cabbage rolls cooked in broth and crushed tomatoes.)

Last spring, I spotted some asparagus starts at the nursery, having failed to find any sets, and put them in the circular bed around the persimmon tree. I'd more or less had that in mind and hadn't planted anything else in the circle except for some random gladioli. More than half the starts survived the year and then this year I did find asparagus sets so I added them into the mix. It looks like they get enough water from the lawn irrigation system, though I've been supplementing with an extra sprinkler last year, both for their benefit and to help the persimmon get a good start. It'll be a couple more years before they'll be established enough to harvest (and who knows how many years before I'll start getting persimmons).

When I watch various of my friends and acquaintances flit about from place to place, I think about how significantly my life plans are affected by my love of growing things. And how tragic it would be if this property eventually went to someone who didn't value the investment.

The tomatoes are in the ground now--the usual 18 varieties. (Well, except I doubled up on Sun Gold cherry tomatoes because they're my absolute favorite.) Some years I've carefully documented which varieties I plant and how they perform. This year I didn't even make a list. I made my usual sacrifice to hope over experience and planted summer squash and eggplant.

I still need to pick and process the second half of the Seville orange crop. (The first half went to Chaz and has been turned into marmelade.) The lemons that were sacrificed to a bout of pruning have been juiced and frozen as cubes (for summer refreshment), plus zested and packed in sugar (for baking use). There are still a few juice oranges on one of the trees. The strawberries are trickling in. And it's time to update the garden calendar with all of this for data tracking purposes.

Thursday evening I figured out I was coming down with a cold (after a day of thinking it was allergies). This conveniently coincided with a three-day rain front so it was a cue to hunker down in rest-and-relax mode without being tempted to attempt to use my body or brain much.

Since I recently swapped my Peacock subscription (since the Olympics are over) for Britbox, I decided to spend multiple days binging Sharpe's Rifles and knitting. (I know the title is actually "Sharpe" but I figured that might be insufficient data for identification.) I rather enjoyed the series except for two plot-requirement aspects.

Most importantly, so much of Sharpe's troubles could have been forestalled by being willing to just outright shoot a nemesis the first time. (I tried to word that sentence with the plural of nemesis, but none of my attempts looked right.) I mean, the whole point of his character is that he's a rough-and-ready, up-from-the-ranks scrapper, not a silly honor-above-all officer-class type. So the insistence on one-on-one sword duels and letting a nemesis escape isn't really in character. (Ok, he has his own brand of honor, but I still think there's a problem here.)

The second plot point is that Jane's betrayal feels utterly contrived. I don't believe a woman who has been through her experiences and had the fortitude to help with field surgery and nursing is going to be so easily led astray. It's like they tossed out her established character because they needed to introduce a new girlfriend. Her later behavior isn't the same person.

But I got a bunch of knitting done.