Rain.

"Hey man, take a look out the window 'n' see what's happ'nin'
Hey man, it's rainin'"
-Jimi Hendrix, "Rainy Day, Dream Away"

I hate to complain about the rain (that falls mainly on the plain). Seeing as I find myself complaining about the general lack of rain often enough. But I find I'm quite adept at complaining about pretty much anything.

I would prefer it to be a bit drier now that it's tomato season. This rainy business creates a breeding ground for blight and fungi (which I like to refer to as "blungi"). And, long story short, that ain't no good for the tomatoes.

Yeah sure, it helps them grow and whatever. But it doesn't exactly help their flavor. It kinda makes them taste a bit watered down. So, in an attempt to remedy that, I've been harvesting them at their first blush of color and letting them ripen on a newspaper-covered table. Seems to help. And they're still better than Red Round Hybrid #370XX4Z. In my relatively biased opinion.

Per usual, I'm already thinking ahead to next season, when I will grow a small percentage of my tomatoes in a hoop house. This will help me get ripe tomatoes earlier, offer tomatoes later and allow me to control the weather conditions a little better.

Everyone has heirlooms in mid-August. Only a few people have them in late-July. Almost nobody has them in mid-July.

And I want to be one of those almost-nobodies.

Oh Yeah, That Blog.

Everywhere I go, people ask me: Where has the blog gone?

Well, it's been a busy week around here this week. Little Conlan fell (jumped?) off of the hay wagon last Sunday morning and broke his leg. He's fine, or at least as fine as one can be with a broken leg, but he's required a lot more attention. This is also his first prolonged exposure to television. Sigh. I guess I knew I couldn't keep him away from it forever...

The tomatoes are really starting to pop. I expect to have at least 50 lb. of first-quality available for Tuesday (hopefully more), and perhaps as many as 30-40 lb. of seconds available as well. I expect to have close to 200 lb. available per week when they really start hitting.

The Leg Incident has really cut into my garlic cleaning time, but I'll clean it to order if nothing else. Right now, it's still rocamboles (Killarney, Korean, Chesnok), but I'll start in on the porcelains next week.

Finally.

Okay, everyone stop panicking. I harvested a few tomatoes today. Soon, the floodgates will...drop? What do floodgates do, do they drop?

Anyway, soon there will be a lot of tomatoes. The ever reliable and delicious Black Prince provided me with not one, but two beauties. One promptly became the T in BBT. (Basil instead of lettuce...arugula works well, too. That's a BAT.) I also found one of my new varieties, Purple Price, a couple Tigerellas and a few different cherries.

I've made my peace with the tomatoes. We're cool now.

Mad at My Tomatoes

Usually mad ABOUT my tomatoes. (80-some varieties, yadda yadda yadda) But not this time.

I'm a bit...disappointed in them right now. I feel they aren't quite living up to their potential. Today was the day. The day they were going to be ready to ship. But outside of maybe 2 dozen Black Cherries and one nearly-ripened Black Prince, I got squat.

I know by next Monday I'll have 20 or 30 lb. ready to ship. And by next Thursday I'll have hundreds of pounds of every imaginable color, shape, size and flavor of tomato ripe and ready to eat.

But I wanted them now.

Oh well, that Black Prince has already been earmarked for a bacon, basil and tomato sammy for Friday's lunch. That'll make me feel better.