Brian’s motorcycle made a trip to the shop this week for the installation of some auxiliary lighting. New headlights, if you will. Brian says this is a safety feature–it will make him more visible in the day and allow him to see more at night. But, I think he did it just because it looks cool.
What do you think?
It’s that time of the year. Today marked Jake’s first day in second grade. Brian got him on the bus this morning and it was all peace and quiet after that. He had a good day at school. This quite contrasted last year when he started complaining, in July, about having to go back to school. This evening, he and his buddies wreaked havoc on the neighborhood. I think they had more fun today than they did all summer. Perhaps it was school that made them realize that summer’s almost over, so might as well make the most of it.
We took Jake to the Westwood Plaza Theatre this evening to see The Simpsons Movie. The movie was good–it was like watching a 90 minute version of the television show. If you like it, you will surely like the movie. We also had supper there–that’s what I like about that place. Good stuff. I got my usual gyro, Jake had a grilled ham and cheese sandwich, and Brian had a burger. There were surprisingly few people watching the movie (less than 10). I thought it was going to be packed. Shows what I know. I guess this was Jake’s last hurrah before going back to school on Wednesday.
Jake’s selling popcorn for the scouts. Apparently the popcorn sale is equivalent to the Girl Scout cookie sale. Though, I’d rather he sold cookies (yum!). I did have some of the popcorn last year and it was good, but it’s rather expensive. Anyway, if anyone wants some–you know where to get it. No need to feel obligated as he’s already sold the minimum amount between us and his grandparents. But, if you’re jonesing for some overpriced popcorn, I can hook you up.
My garden fared pretty well this year. As usual, some things did better than others. My two experiments–broccoli rabe and celery–did not pan out. Most of the celery went to seed (though I guess there’s still a chance I’ll get something from it) and the broccoli rabe was devoured by insects. I’ll probably try the broccoli rabe again, but I think I’ll pass on the celery. My garlic took a hit this year. I don’t know what happened with that. Probably 1/3 of it didn’t germinate. But, I plant a lot, so I still got a lot. My tomatoes were doing so-so. I had a bunch that were ripe early this week, but I didn’t get a chance to pick them until after all of the storms. When I went outside, I found most of them had burst on the vine (presumably from all of the water). I was not happy about this. The plum tomatoes came though relatively unscathed, so I froze a bunch of those this week. But, I was really hoping for more tomatoes this year.
Of the three years I planted potatoes, I had the best harvest this year, so I will continue with that practice. My peppers did great. I like to freeze my extras, so you can never have too many. And speaking of too much of a good thing, I had a bumper cucumber crop this year. The past few years, I haven’t had much luck with them, so I planted twice as many as usual this year. Unfortunately for me, this year proved to be a good cucumber year so I had dozens and dozens and dozens of cukes to get rid of this summer. I also got a nice crop of carrots. Carrots are one of my favorite things to harvest because you never know what you’re going to get until you pull them from the ground.
Everything else did fine. I’m trying an experiment for the fall–the other week, I planted some broccoli rabe, beets, carrots, and radishes. We’ll see how that goes. It’s too cold up here to have a 4 season garden, but if I can squeeze in a few extra months, that would make me happy.