To The Surbiton Manor Born

It is an exceptional year for garden productivity. I'm currently reading William Alexander's Ten Tomatoes That Changed the World , and learned that some in Renaissance Europe would refer to the reviled tomato as "Galen's wolf peach," a poisonous fruit described by Galen of Pergemon [the second century AD doctor who expounded on Hippocrates' theory of "humors" and human disease] as a lost, poisonous fruit...possessing strong smelling yellow juice. Tomatoes are a much loved food here. But we now have so many of them, that we were forced to buy a deep freezer to process them. As soon as you get one batch processed, another one comes in. In spite of eating tomato sandwiches, tomatoes as snacks, tomatoes with mozzarella cheese, more just keep on coming, like hordes of orcs at the siege of Helm's Deep, only much more delicious. Same thing with zucchini. And beans. And banana peppers... No more time to write. Time to harvest.  

  Toho's Mechagodzilla While the cluster of technologies captured under the marketing term “ artificial intelligence ” has positive, legitimate uses, it is vitally important that we also consider its limitations and the - in many cases - unacceptable consequences of its proliferation into every aspect of our lives. Today, “AI” is in desperate need of regulation to contain its toxic effects on the environment - including energy use, carbon emissions and water use - the spread of misinformation, its vulnerability to censorship, and the ways in which it damages human intelligence (which are just now coming to light). This is not a Luddite tract claiming that the technology needs to be completely eliminated. It is an argument for getting beyond the hype about its supposed capabilities, and for creating reasonable rules around its use. Terminology: “Artificial Intelligence” is an umbrella term for a series of technologies that automate decision making, classification, recommendation, t...

It is harvest time. One thing the illustration above does not show is the large number of football-sized zucchini that are making their appearance. While I love a purple pole bean, I won't exactly be heartbroken when they slow down. This week's harvest newcomers are tomatoes. We've just pulled in the first few. The vines are laden with many more to come.  This has necessitated some innovations on the "how will we eat all of this" front. Made a double batch of zucchini bread yesterday. Made more refrigerator pickles. Gave away more cucumbers. Vacuum-sealed more pole beans and tossed them in the freezer. It is time consuming. But this is what it is all about. All that work raising the seedlings, the planting, the weeding. Time to reap what was sown. And we are getting some delicious stuff. The weather has been wet, hot, and humid. Over the past few days we've had about three inches of rain, and more storms are on their way tonight. It doesn't really rain, so...

It's just past mid-summer and the harvest is beginning. Probably the most prolific vegetable at the moment is the purple pole bean. We have pounds of them. Fortunately, they make a good stir fry. Zucchini is presenting its usual challenge: catch them when they are small, not the size of baseball bats. We've had mixed results. Fortunately zucchini fries are delicious.  We've made sweet pickles, dill pickles, pickled banana peppers.  We've harvested beets and a few sprigs of lettuce that managed to grow. The tomatoes are on point to begin. At this point, we are contemplating our options.  So far, we've always been able to eat what we grow (or give it away) without the need for canning. But our freezer is finite. Do we start canning? Is vacuum sealing enough to preserve the food until we can get to it? Do we need to buy a small chest freezer?  I have taken this coming Monday off, in part to process some of the food we're producing. As the tomatoes go from green to ...

 It's hard to believe that only a month or so ago we were talking raspberries. The garden really is a bit too much to handle right now. As Airbourne, the Greta Van Fleet of AC/DC put it, " Too Much, Too Young, Too Fast ."  They are done now, and the canes that produced this year need to be cut back. A couple of vacations happened (Pictured Rocks Nat'l Park & Charlevoix, Michigan for the marathon & the Boundary Waters). And the garden exploded. The purple beans are popping. The snow peas are just about done. The zucchini have spawned. The tomatoes are there, but green. The cucumbers are producing. The carrots & beets are pretty much ready. The tiny, sad bit of lettuce has produced. The kale has been devoured by Asian beetles. The pumpkins & squash are blossoming and climbing the trellis. The sunflowers are blooming.  Love summer.

  Bam! Strawberries! We have this tendency to go on vacation over the summer solstice. While we were gone, the garden burst into life. Just about every year, this is right when the strawberries are ready for harvest. This was no different, except that we were able to harvest right before we left instead of missing it. We only have one 4x8 bed of strawberries, so we don't get too many. But those that we do get are delicious. While we were on our road trip in our new van to Pictured Rocks National Park on Lake Superior and in Charlevoix, Michigan, running the marathon there, the garden was busy growing. Pound sign Van Life is fantastic. My whole life I have wedged my camping gear into small cars because they make sense. You only go camping rarely, and it isn't worth sacrificing gas mileage in a daily driver for a couple of weeks a year. K. and I looked longingly at fancy travel vans - Mercedes Sprinters that cost $200K. Do-it-yourself Fords that would sit in the driveway 50 weeks...