weekly bits #11

garden failures, dog friends, spicy barbecue sauce & that bachelor in paradise finale

Hello hello my friends, hope you’ve had a lovely week! It’s been a quiet and focused one over here, with every ounce of free time going towards our DIY renovation research and execution. Much rain, many cracks of thunder! Our poor dogs are having an awful time, as they both hate the thunder, as well as stepping foot outside into the yard to go to the bathroom when it is even slightly wet. The horror.

Onwards!

1. We’ve had some failures in the garden department. A diabolical and likely very cute vole has had his run of the roost and eaten both the fruits and the roots of our labor — meaning even the produce itself he didn’t eat, he ate the roots of, effectively murdering what was left of our garden. Alas. This was a learning year, and we got a few great bites out of it. Some funny final harvests:

   

   A beautiful heirloom variety of flint corn, which was almost perfect, except that the kernels didn’t quite make it to the tip.

   

   The roots of our artichoke plant, which Sam harvested thinking it was the actual rotted, dead artichoke and that it was a root vegetable. For what it’s worth, I believed it. I’d like to vouch that despite the evidence, he’s actually a very intelligent man.

2. A success to balance things out: I hit my 300-day Duolingo streak in Spanish. I’d like to thank RJ Hatanaka, my longest friendship streak partner, as well as my mother, who takes second place.

Below the paywall: what we got up to for Labor Day, Leonard’s best friend, our weekend TV binge, my favorite new recipe and more. x