Farm Bulletin

I have one big garden news bulletin--one of the potatoes has sprouted above the bale.  Well, it's really on the side of the bale but there are leaves.  I'm so excited to grow potatoes again.   Of all the things I grow those seem the most like magic since all of their growing occurs underground (or understraw).






There's a bud opening on Dad's rose.  There are a bunch of buds all over but only one is almost open.  It smells so good.  Thanks, Dad!



 

Last week at ALDI I grabbed a bag of cara cara oranges, a variety of navel orange with red-orange flesh, and finally got around to trying one yesterday.  Oh, mercy, are they good--juicy and sweet--and such a lovely color.  I love oranges.




Since the end of May I've been determined to get my brain back into the habit of writing every day.  I read once that since athletes train and artists sketch, it only makes sense for writers to practice by writing every day, get those writing muscles limbered up.  I stopped daily prompt writing a year ago and now I'm paying the price for my slacker ways but I'm working to get back into the swing of things.




I finished the washcloth this afternoon.  The color is much prettier in person with the swan (white) and flamingo (pink) yarns intertwining.  The photo doesn't do it justice.  Now I have to figure out what to knit next.  Maybe mittens to go with the slip stitch hat...




07  June--Barbara Malcolm, Tropical Obsession. 

            Every one of them watched the same sunset. Everyone alone.

            Mona stood on her patio holding a drink and staring at the fiery ball sinking behind the small low island smeared on the horizon, listening intently for a car to stop on the gravel out front.

            Bunny sat with his back against a tree in the front yard of his ramshackle house behind the big supermarket slapping at the occasional mosquito brave or foolish enough to fly through the cloud of herb smoke, listening to Bob Marley wail, and nodding his head at Brother Bob's words.

            Jack sat in the mouth of the cave he had spent the day in. He had been sure that morning that he was in the perfect spot to catch Manning pulling a fast one, salting the submerged wreck just offshore, but he had been wrong. He stood, stretched, and watched the bottom of the sun's disc touch the horizon. As it did there was a rustling behind him and suddenly a huge stream of bats flew out of the cave, swirling like smoke around him.

            Santiago sat on the deck of the Santa Rosalia, a cigarette in one hand and a Polar beer in the other. The rest of the Venezuelans who came over with produce to sell were either on the dock or the stinkpot diesel trawler Abierto his boat was rafted to. They were all laughing and calling out to the women walking down the waterfront to the restaurants further into town. Santiago was quiet and watchful.

            Manning stood among the raucous tourists celebrating sunset in the bar cantilevered out over the ocean at Sand Dollar resort, his eyes darting like lasers. He made it a habit to cruise the resort bars once a week to keep a lookout for his next pigeon and he thought he had found a live one to replace Jack Spencer who was getting all too suspicious and would have to be cut loose. This one was fat, pink, and balding, wearing a sickly yellow aloha shirt printed with mutant flowers and worn unbuttoned enough to display the outsized gold doubloon necklace that told Manning that the wearer imagined himself a pirate. He downed the rest of his beer and got ready to move in.

I walked around the block this afternoon.  It was a gorgeous day, too nice to stay indoors all day, so off I went.  It's hard to motivate myself to walk but I'm so out of shape that I can't keep up with anyone and I don't want to go back to the Y even though it's open and they're charging me the membership fee.  It seems wrong to go work out with strangers when I can't hug my family.  Maybe next month.  I need a haircut too.  I'll call FL tomorrow to see about that.  Can I wear a mask while he cuts my hair?

Today is DIL1's birthday.  Happy Birthday, Sweetheart!  I'm so glad you're part of my family.
--Barbara