Mom finally sent me the photo she took of me on the porch of the main building in Luckenbach, so I thought I would share.

It’s about ten thousand degrees outside, and I am physically worthless today, so my outdoor activities have consisted of nothing more than watering the plants on the porch and training the snap peas to grow on the trellis. Did you know, if you are really patient, you can actually see the little feelers gripping onto the thing you want them to grip onto? Well, you can, but you have to be really, really patient … like fifteen minutes worth of patient.

And as if to thumb their nose at me, those Better Boy tomatoes (I’d been calling them Best Boy, which is wrong) grew a couple of inches in the last 24 hours, and one of them now has blooms on it. I guess I have to let them live.

I’m beginning to consider that I need to think of things to do with a lot of tomatoes, because I am now beginning to suspect I am going to have a lot of tomatoes later this summer.

In other garden news, those two banana peppers are getting bigger! I didn’t even have to use the macro lens on the camera this time!

This is a different plant from the one I posted the photo of the other day. This Sugar Snack tomato had no tomatoes at all on it yesterday morning, and by yesterday evening, it had tiny tomatoes popping out all over the place … and more blooms!

I have no idea how long it takes these cherry tomatoes to ripen. I have never grown cherry tomatoes before. All I know is I am so impatient to eat one!

Grow tiny tomatoes! Grow!

Where did that tomato come from? I stick my nose on those plants every day, sometimes more than once a day, and I would swear there was no tomato on that plant yesterday. What a pleasant surprise to start my dreary and potentially rainy day!

I think this is the Super 100 Cherry Tomato. I say I think that’s what it is, because I don’t know which is which anymore. When I re-potted them, I put the little plastic tabs back into the pots, and sometime between Sunday and yesterday, every last one of them has gone missing. I doubt it can be blamed on critters, because they might knock them out of the pots, but they don’t usually run off with them. I suspect a two-legged critter by the name of Annoying Boy. I’ll have to compare the unlabeled pots with the labeled ones and try to figure out which is which, I guess.

I guess adding the composted manure on Sunday, and the last few days of coffee grounds and leftover coffee have done that plant some good. I have been particularly focusing on that one, because it looked really bad on Sunday with yellow leaves that were starting to curl up and fall off, and generally just bad color to the whole plant. I thought it was on the way to an early death. This morning, it’s green and perky … and it has a tomato on it!

The photo makes it look huge. I assure you, it isn’t. Right now my precious first tomato is about the size of a dime. It better not fall off or get eaten. I would be so heartbroken. I can’t wait to eat my own tomatoes.

There are also three peppers that have set on the Banana Pepper plant. Woo hoo! I am so excited!

Also, I am somewhat pleased with the above photo, so I uploaded a larger version so you can see the detail. Considering how dark and windy it is outside, and the fact I can’t use a flash when using the macro settings, I was surprised by how well it turned out … and how you can see the dew on the little hairs. I love my camera.

I have to take my tomato happy self to Walgreens, and then I have to attempt to restore the kitchen to some kind of order. I have totally ignored the dishes for far too long, as I almost always do.

But I have a tomato and some peppers! On top of the ice dispenser on the fridge being repaired yesterday, this week is going pretty damn well so far. Just wish I felt better, but I guess I can’t have everything my way.

They say the cobbler’s children have no shoes. Engineer’s wives apparently don’t have well-built trellises for their snap beans either, not because the engineer is too busy designing and building trellises for other people, but because the engineer is too busy laughing at his wife’s feeble attempts to build something. It’s pretty common knowledge that I am an artist and not a builder, so I failed to be amused by his amusement.

An hour and a half of my life spent making a trellis, and the end result is, I must admit myself, hilariously feeble and must be the most ridiculous trellis on the planet. I think I even heard the snap beans laughing at me.

Go ahead. Laugh. Everyone else has … even me. It’s a pathetic excuse for a trellis, but it’s just going to have to do.

I haven’t seen a mantis out in the wild for so long I can’t remember the last time. But … today … right there on my banana pepper plant is a baby mantis! Hope he sticks around and eats all those nasty bugs that have been chewing on that plant when I am not looking.

He’s soooo tiny! Maybe 1/4 inch long. Here’s hoping he grows and grows and grows!

Here is the bike that was just the source of a heated discussion:

It was built on October 6, 1964, and it’s a Schwinn Co-Ed. After doing some further research, even if it was in much, much better condition, it would be worth about $150, which means this one is worth much, much less. I have now been given permission to do whatever I want with it.

I don’t know what I want to do with it. I like it, and it would be neat to have a working bicycle, but it’s going to have to have the rust removed, the gears and such cleaned and lubed, and it will need to be primed and painted … and probably needs new tires and tubes. I guess I have to decide if I personally feel like doing that much work on it and whether or not I will use it enough once that’s done to make it all worthwhile. It would be great if someone mechanically inclined would help me fix it up so I could ride it, but that isn’t going to happen. This will be another of those projects that is “all on me” to do. I guess I’ll take a few days to think about it. In the meantime, it’s moving outside, because I am not putting it back in the Box Room, and it can’t very well sit in the kitchen for a few days.

Wow, an hour goes by fast when you are hopped up on coffee and trying to get things done! I felt the urge to deal with more stuff in the Box Room, but I am going to force myself to stick to an hour a day (except maybe weekends when laziness and yard work rule). That way I won’t get burnt out on it … hopefully.

Now I need to go find a box cutter. We are bound to have at least one around here or in my truck. I have a bunch of boxes to cut down and bundle up. That’s a good feeling.

I may even post photos later. Not that it doesn’t still look like a nightmare of a room just filled with boxes of junk, because it does, but I am rather pleased with my progress.

But first, more coffee and a box cutter search.

UPDATE: I forgot to hit the post button before toddling off on my next mission(s). Oops. I’ll blame it on the coffee buzz.

So now I spent another hour chopping cardboard boxes into 2 foot by 2 foot squares, bundling them, and putting them out for the recycling truck. I was a little grumpy about the trash trucks coming late today, but in the end, it’s a good thing. Otherwise, I’d have had bundles of cardboard sitting around somewhere until next Thursday. As soon as they come empty the trash bin, I’m going to go stuff today’s bag of garbage into it. I don’t know what to do about all the huge pieces of Styrofoam I need to get rid of. Too much to put in the bin, because we do have actual household trash that needs to go in there for the week too, and recycling doesn’t take it. Maybe I can convince Lin to take it with him to work and toss it in one of the construction dumpsters. I suppose I could pay the surcharge for extra bags of trash next week, but I would really rather not. We pay enough for trash pickup as it is.

Not going to make it to the craft store today. I will be running to the drugstore though. We are out of aspirin, and I desperately need one right now.

Behind the cut … promised photos of the embarrassing mess known as the Box Room and some more babbling.
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Dinner was different tonight. It’s the first time I made these! They were very tasty.

Take that Freebirds! No more do I have to drive to your location and pay you ridiculous amounts of money for ridiculous sized burritos!