Winterizing

Update 10/31/10

1. I pulled up all the tomato plants yesterday. I saved three of the green tomatoes and put them on the windowsill. This morning, they’re turning red.
2. I’ve promoted several of my once-nicest wool sweater—sweaters I once wore to church and funerals—to around-the-house wear. I mean, I now wear them over my pajamas. I’m wearing a moth-eaten one right now.
3. I’ve plugged the ventilation holes in the bee hives, I’ve closed the screened bottom boards that gives them air in the summer, I’ve reduced the size of their entrances. Stay warm, bees.
4. My neighbor, John, asked me yesterday if I’ve been writing anything. I told him, no. He suggested I need a designated place to write. I agreed.
5. John said that from his nice office with its long conference table at Merrill Lynch he looks down into a vacant loft space with hardwood floors and floor-to-ceiling windows. He says he often wants to move his office there.
6. Funny how we yearn to move into a place like that.
7. But I told him that I’m looking for perhaps a smaller space. Windows, yes. Hardwood floors, yes. But probably not downtown. That’s too expensive.
8. He said that he now wants to rearrange his office.
9. I suggested he lose the conference table. No one really wants to sit at a conference table.
10. Put a workbench in there, I said. And tools. Everyone likes to go to work when there’s a workbench in the room.

My pumpkin

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Time Passes and Things Change and Nothing Changes and I Have a Tomato

Things have a way of straightening themselves out, I suppose. My computer remained funked up all day yesterday, so last night I sent three or four frantic messages to Jerod who wisely ignored them all. I think he’s learned to wait out the frantic in silence. So, I thought, “Hey, instead of waiting on more weirdo fonts to appear in more places, I’ll just turn the computer off and give it a good rest for a while and see what that does.” I waited about 30 seconds and turned it on again and everything was back to normal. I sent Jerod a final message saying “Nevermind.”

And I know you want to know how these babies are doing. Today could be the day:

First tomato 2010

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To Do 8/5/10

To Do 8/5/10

1. Shake the dust from the novel
2. Start canning all these tomatoes my neighbor gives us
3. This is always a big job, but I love having a pantry full of pretty jars
4. Call the house sitter
5. Call Louise
6. Check on rent for a little storefront on Blue Ash Road in the rundown part of Deer Park
7. I don’t know what I’m gonna do with a little store, but why not?
8. I mean, I’ve never opened a little store
9. But I don’t want to sit there from 10-5, so expect poor business
10. Buy coffee. There’s only enough here for one more cup

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Those Aren’t Flowers!

Want to see something funny?

This spring we ran out of potting soil to use in our window boxes; so, I used some of the dirt from the bottom of my compost heap. It was beautiful. Dark, rich, lovely.

And now there are tomato plants growing like gangbusters in every single window box.

Tomato plants in the flower boxes

Tomato plants in the flower boxes

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