Feeling Saucy

The end of summer is always crazy and I have been busier than I have every been — mostly covering for people on vacation but I also have a few big projects going on at work. It has also been crazy hot, so on my days off I am usually pretty worn out and if I wasn’t, it has generally been too hot to work in the yard.

Upside of that is that, assuming I can keep them watered, the tomatoes have been great this year. I was pretty bummed out that the plant that was suppose to be a stupice (my favorite slicing tomato) turned out to be a grape tomato. Oh well. Also, once again, the stripy roma keeps getting blossom rot — problem with under watering. But the green zebra, black krum, and yellow boy are awesome and super flavorful, although not very big — think golf ball.

black krums and green zebras

Black krums and green zebras

Lemon boys

Lemon boys. These made awesome sauce!

tomato mix

The full mix, from a different harvest than the other two pix. The yellow boys became the sauce to go with the zucchini, which was transformed into a kick-ass veggie lasagna.

Another Side Project

I actually finished this project a few weeks ago, but I have been so crazy busy and distracted I didn’t take pictures so I could blog about it. My very good friend and Editorial Page Editor John Laird is retiring so The Columbian needed to fill his position. The Sports Editor Greg Jayne ended up getting promoted to the job and then my boss Micah Rice was promoted to Sports Editor. That left the copy desk without a fearless leader. So as assistant news editor, it made sense for me to try for it. And I got it. I am now, or will be at the end of this month when everyone shifts around, the News Editor at The Columbian. So far it is being really stressful and one of the first things on my to-do list is to fill our vacant position. I am excited for the challenge but also nervous. So we’ll see. The next few months are going to be insane!

Anyway, this project was pretty easy to throw together — just laid down some more of that leftover mulch that I removed when redoing the front patio and artfully arrange some of my pots. Planted a few extra things in said pots and done. But I love how it looks. And it is a good place to have some of my more heat-sensitive herbs — parsley, cilantro, sorrel — so they don’t bolt as fast.

herb garden bed

Looks super cute. On the other side of the walk, the blueberries are doing great. And the chamomile and callengula are filling out. I also threw some sunflower seeds that Eric Murray got in a wedding invitation last year in the ground and was surprised, not only that they came up, but that they are doing great.

And now that things are looking so cute back here, I have been trying to take time to enjoy it. So after a long weekend of weeding, I fired up the grill and cooked dinner.

grilling

A rib-eye steak and zucchini from the garden

Dinner

Steak, grilled zucchini and a arugula, blueberry and corn salad. (arugula and some of the blueberries are from my garden.) Holy crap it was delicious!

And as an added bonus, here is one of my more-awesome day lilies, that I snap a pic of today.

orange lily

Super cute orange day lily. Have I mentioned that I love orange?