So far today, I’ve pulled up all the turnips (they were really looking bad, and I ended up with a colander full of useable turnips; the rest will go in the compost bin), planted carrots where the turnips were, planted sunflowers where the sunflowers never sprouted, planted 18 basil plants, planted a dozen marigolds, staked the smaller tomatoes (which are growing quite quickly now that it rained), weeded the rest of the side flowerbed (yay!), smiled at my three ripening First Lady tomatoes, realized that planting four sweet 100 tomatoes around the trellis was probably not a good idea, tried to coax my cucumbers to go up the trellis, decided that was enough for the day, and now I’m inside.

I have to eat lunch and then I’ll write a bit–I did write a little this morning while I was eating breakfast. (Honey Nut Cheerios with fresh blueberries (not from my blueberries, of course, but the same source we got blueberries from last year. And yes, I have to make more granola.)

I still have basil plants left. I still have one spot where the lettuce is still growing (and still edible; the two lettuce plants in the big garden are going to seed) for more carrots, and I still have some eggplants and tomatoes, too, but I think they’re just going to end up in the compost bin, because I HAVE NO MORE ROOM. And let’s see–28 planted tomatoes in the big garden, plus three or four volunteers, plus 12 planted tomatoes in Ethan’s garden plus at least 15 remaining volunteers (I mulched over the little ones)–that’s at least 59 tomato plants. I’m going to be swamped. I DO NOT NEED TO PLANT THE LAST FOUR.

There. Maybe that will convince me! I feel guilty not planting them, though!

The eggplant in the big garden are getting eaten by fleabeetles, but the ones in the cistern bed look great and are growing sans fleabeetles. We’ll see how they end up growing; if I lose the ones in the big garden, it’s obviously no big deal. But the potatoes survived, and the beans survived the fleabeetle attacks, so maybe the eggplants will as well.

Out of the four pepper plants I planted in between the turnips and the swiss chard, three are still alive. They were buried in the turnips, so I uncovered them and we’ll see what happens. I think they are just regular peppers, so that’s ok if they don’t do anything.

Oh, and I forgot–I need to pick the broccoli again. I’ll have to do that this evening, I guess.

57,726 and I’m getting ready to head to bed. Boy, what a series of depressing chapters!

I don’t really mean depressing; that was just the first word that came to mind. I’m a bit tired.

*Yawn* (I almost typed ‘yarn’.)

Ok, I think it’s time.

56,242 at the moment. I’m going to write as much as I can tonight. I’d say my goal is 60k, but I’m not sure I can do that. We’ll see.

Another bit of rain this morning, and when I walked out in the garden earlier, I picked enough beans to eat for supper (with a few of the small potatoes) and I also ate my second tomato. Yum!

54,486 as of last night. Something bad is about to happen! A quick check tells me that I’ve written 12,471 words (or thereabouts) in six days. That’s not counting today!

I walked back out to the garden and tied up some tomatoes that had fallen over. The wind did a number on just about everything, and one tomato plant got cracked, but it’s still attached, so I piled dirt around its base and will hope for the best. I think it will help if I stake it, which I plan to do this weekend.

But my zucchini and squash plants were all wind-tossed and messy. No deaths, though, as far as I can tell. And I bet I have beans ready to pick on Monday. (!!!)

Rice Milk Recipe (for Jenny and anyone else who might want it.)

1/2 c. rice
4 cups water
Vanilla, to taste
Sugar, to taste, or other sweetener

Combine rice and water, cook until rice is really soft. (I microwaved it in my microwave rice cooker for probably 15 minutes.) Pour resulting mess into blender or food processor; I used the ‘puree’ button on my blender. I put the vanilla and just a teensy bit of sugar in at this time. I think I probably put a teaspoon of vanilla in.

The original directions then said to strain through a cheesecloth–hahahaha. What I ended up with was rice milk pudding (think Jell-o pudding) that was rather thick. And in truth, the bits were so tiny, it wasn’t worth straining them out anyway, so I didn’t.

I poured what I had into a 32 oz. glass fridge bottle and diluted it with water until it was full. It’s still a bit thick, but not much thicker than say, Vitamin D milk. It looks like milk. It smells like rice pudding, though, which isn’t really a horrible thing. It tastes okay. I could use it with cereal and not notice that much. Drinking it straight, though, might take some getting used to. More vanilla might be the answer, or something else that I haven’t thought of yet.

I am going to experiment a bit more with it, and see if you can mix other types of milk with it–I’ve heard an almond/rice milk mixture is good. I’m also going to try sunflower seed milk, just because it sounds really… strange, but it’s also supposed to be good. We’ll see.

I think this is really neat.

We have gotten probably an inch and a half of rain! YAY!

I picked the Monster Tomato, because after an inch and a half of rain, I thought it would split. It weighs a pound and a half! It can safely ripen on my countertop for a couple of days–I think it was really close.

I also picked a ripe tomato, and I have more zucchini coming on! Yippee!

I am going to go do some dishes, and then write for a bit. Someone is having a bit of a crisis. (Not the dead person. Well, actually, technically, I guess he is dead–that’s what happens when you write about vampires.)

Lovely storm last night (ok, it was rather loud, but I also have a full wheeled container of rainwater now and a five gallon bucket too) so we got a nice amount of rain for a change.

Of course, the June Bugs swimming in the rainwater are kind of nasty, but oh well. That’s what happens when the leaky gutter is near the back porch light, I guess! I’ll have to clean it out when I get home.

From a quick look (I didn’t walk down to the garden, but I will peruse on my way out this morning) everything seems to be intact. Here’s to hoping it’s all still intact when I get home this evening!

(I really, really need to do stuff around the house, but SYWTBAV is going so well it’s kind of hard to stop. So I haven’t done the dishes all week long yet. And the litterboxes need to be cleaned out too. Maybe tonight, I hope.)

52,282–and the death that I’ve been working up to for the past few chapters.

Despite the fact that this person isn’t technically dead–he is and he isn’t–I’m still taking a short break before beginning the next chapter to give him a moment of silence.

I always get a bit teary-eyed when I kill someone, even if I know that person isn’t really truly dead.

In other news, it rained so hard at work this afternoon (it started right when I was supposed to leave) that I ended up completely soaked. My dress was dripping. I was dripping, all the way home. It did rain here this morning, but alas, we didn’t get the storm.

However, there’s a decent chance of rain tonight, and a really good chance tomorrow. Hopefully they’ll be more in tune to our actual forecast; I’m not in a very trusting mood when it comes to weathermen at the moment after the 90% rain flub-up.

Oh, and I attempted to make rice milk tonight. I’m not holding my breath, because I found it quite hilarious that my directions said to strain it through cheesecloth when it was the consistency of cheese (okay, maybe cream cheese), but I diluted it with more water and crossed my fingers and am hoping for the best. If milk is going to end up costing $4.50 a gallon (or so!) like they’re saying, then I need an alternative for my breakfast granola, because I’m not paying that much for something I only use for cooking and/or on cereal. I very rarely drink milk. Back when I lived in Columbus, I couldn’t finish a half gallon without it going bad, because I didn’t drink enough. So alternatives would be nice, especially alternatives I can make myself. (And I’m not going to buy one of those soymilk makers.)

50,666 as of last night, so I’m happy with that. I reached my goal.

I’m also not quite sure what happens next (I hate ending at the end of a chapter!) but I’m sure I’ll figure it out. I have all morning at work (while I’m working, of course) to let my subconscious work on it.

I am very tired this morning. I’m going to blame it on the humidity.

Ha! My gas bill for June? $24.73
I’m going to save so much money this year. Hahaha!

And I picked my first tomato! (Pictured with two of the larger potatoes that I ate for supper (a microwave version of my Potato, etc. Scramble.)

I am going to try my best to get to 50k on SYWTBAV tonight.