Waking up at 6am and sitting in the car for a couple hours does have its benefits, like listening to the commentary on NPR with Nancy Pearl on further under the radar: more books not to miss, including After, a book of poetry from Jane Hirshfield.

To Wake at 3:00

To wake at 3:00
and not want to go back to sleep
is different
from waking and wanting
not to go back to sleep.
Thoughts
come to the mind,
predictable almost as breath.
The day's small errors and failures.
wrong words that were said,
right ones that were not.

Outside the window
a truck, with yellow lights
running the length of its body
and R&L Cargo lettered large down its side,
diesels the street inexplicably backward.

Making its own deliveries,
equally exhausted, from some great distance.

From After by Jane Hirshfield. All rights reserved.

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Psst....

I've got Amazon Prime, if anyone wants to take advantage of free 2 day shipping...

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They start out looking innocent enough:

Baby

But if you miss one in the climbing leaves and vines, they morph into the size of the cats (honestly, I checked and checked and this was the one I just missed):

What is this thing?

Some of the other ones caught before becoming gigantic in size make for good toppings on salad, though running with the play with your food theme, you could play tic tac toe with this one cumber:

oxoxox

First batch of pickling good, so next batch underway:

pickled

Recipe soon, must spot check C's work for emailing.  

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The aforementioned tomatoes that are not turning red are hefty and now possibly under attack by Bert and Ernie, on either side of the garden.

eek_hornworm

That's a tobacco hornworm, upside down, yo and talk about patches of goosebumps, right?

These are the tomatoes that have survived and there's a patch of green ones in the center of the garden that we're hoping will make it:

tomatoes

Incidentally, hornworms turn into moths
 

Pests: friend or foe?

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All righty. The vegetables in the garden are growing like crazy and first we have butternut squash galore...

Like the baby growing:

And then the stockpile:

It's gotten so that we're creating art of sorts from them (check the two at left whispering to each other about the one about to be sacrificed):

All fun aside, the squash shan't go to waste and after a search online, and some quality time at the stove with $10 in ingredients, ladies and gentlemen, butternut squash soup:

Ingredients:

One 2-pound butternut squash—quartered, seeded, peeled and cut into 2-inch pieces
6 cups low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth
5 thyme sprigs
2 garlic cloves, halved
2 medium leeks, white and pale green parts only, cut into 2-inch pieces
1 celery rib, cut into 2-inch pieces
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 thick slices of bacon, cut crosswise 1/2 inch thick
2 packed cups coarsely chopped collards or kale
One 15-ounce can pinto or roman beans, drained and rinsed
1 medium carrot, finely diced
1 red bell pepper, finely diced
1 cup corn kernels
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

1.    In a large, heavy pot, combine the broth, squash, thyme, garlic, leeks and celery and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer over low heat for 45 minutes.
2.    In a medium skillet, heat the vegetable oil. Add the bacon strips and cook over moderately high heat, turning once, until crisp, about 7 minutes.
3.    Discard the thyme sprigs from the soup. Working in batches, puree the soup in a blender. ***you may want to save a few chunks of squash for presentation purposes*** Return the soup to the pot. Add the bacon, collards, pinto beans, carrot, bell pepper and corn and bring to a boil. Simmer over moderately low heat, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are tender, about 7 minutes. Season the soup with salt and pepper and serve.

Make ahead: The soup can be refrigerated overnight. Reheat gently.
Nutritional content for one serving: 264 cal, 10 gm fat, 1.4 gm sat fat, 37 gm carb, 7 gm fiber.

Thanks to the lovely photos on What Did You Eat for being the inspiration to make this delicious soup.

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Ring Ring

Mika

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Looks like everyone's doing some traveling for the summer, and to begin, over the weekend, a cousin drove down from Seattle with her three sons (7th grade, 5th grade, 2nd grade respectively). The kiddos liked the walking machine and alternated between the PS2 and their own DS, stayed long enough for corn (12 for $2 at Ralphs!) and some ice cream.

Oh, but if we could only bottle their energy!

The cuz is running her own pizza shop with her husband, and the way she described the dough making process...mmmm. Also, the shop previously was an Indian pizza shop and their pizza combos? Spinach and ginger! Now that I think of it, this could all be a good excuse to visit for the upcoming ALA midwinter conference...though I'm holding out for the annual one in '08 in Anaheim. Ahh..any musicians up in Seattle anytime soon? :)

BTW, her husband's taking the two older kids for his vacation in a few weeks: a 50 mile canoe ride with his two older sons and the cub scouts.

50 miles! [sputter]!

The next afternoon, it was out to RH for another veggie meal reunion and, knowing the food there, I cheated and had two leftover tacos as a starter! HA! Then, because the other cousin had to run through a sales pitch for his first job (huzzah!) we headed to the house on the hill to...ah, really eat some more and let mother nature kick our ass as we climbed up the hill in his backyard. I have pics of the hill somewhere on LJ, which show how the steps up the mountain are constructed entirely of used tires. But really, were we moving like old ladies up and down the hill and it wasn't a big surprise that our legs were greviously sore next day. Egads!

More chitchat thereafter, some nosing about for more details of C's trip to Hong Kong by the uncle, and further nosing about on another cousin's now solo business venture involving Gucci wallets. Then, on the drive home passed the park which looked busier than usual and, after heading back and feeding the cats way past their dinnertime, we walked over to the park to check out the scene: a pre-4th of July fireworks celebration! Looks like our little city is getting fancy:

fireworks

More traveling set for tomorrow, when Momma Lin heads back to Taiwan, which means a) the rest of us will be dropping some pounds and b) her babies will need tending to. Wait, let me clarify: her babies are the poppings up of greenery and such in the garden:

Need to start developing that green thumb, and C suggested a project of spiffy-ing up the scene by the kitchen window, so that'll be exercise of another sort. It's just we'll have to wait until either the early morning or late afternoons for the 100 degree temps to cool off...

Wish me luck!

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Airport

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Courtesy of Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me! Listen to it here on the June 9th show.

"Great news from Google, their new street view feature...allows you to see what a street actually looks like as if you were standing right there. They did it by taking millions of digital photos from moving vans. But the pictures also show rather surprising things, including a man sitting on a bench in San Jose, California doing what?"

181SanCarlosSt

Mashable also has a photo of a crime in progress (#2 in their top 15 sightings) and a sad story of Cornelius, a homeless man, and his dog.

We're just human, after all.

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