We have a plethora of Farmer’s Markets in our area from late May to late October. Most of them carry products other than farm grown crops, and they are a delight to the senses.
Shrimp, crab, kale, pumpkins, glads, squash, lettuce, vinegars, honey, mushrooms, apples, bread, cheese, ears of dried corn, bales of straw, dried sunflower heads, the last tomatoes and corn of the year. You can make incredible meals from the bounty they sell.
I’ll miss the giant garlic heads, and leeks, the tiny pickle cucumbers, the fresh green beans, and the raspberries, and the man who sharpens my knives.
We’re blessed with abundance. The Farmer’s Market is the best way I know to get food at it’s freshest. Seven months, and they’ll be back. I’ll know that summer is almost upon us when the Market opens again.

Beauty salons and spas are being asked to watch for evidence of spousal abuse on their clients. It makes sense that people in the personal care industry would be among the first to see signs of abuse.
My understanding is that unless a woman asks for assistance, you can’t do anything about spousal abuse. If a salon is willing to educate people about abuse, or will act as a clearinghouse for assistance information, then this might be a good idea. If the salon is merely reporting the abuse, but doing nothing to help the woman, then what’s the purpose?

Did anyone else hear Paul Harvey today announce that France has vetoed proposed billboards showing bare female butts???
I need to surf some more to find out what that was all about….

I have TMJ. If I remember correctly, thats Temporal Mandibular Joint disease. It means I grit my teeth unintentionally. Unfortunately, it also means that I am breaking some of my teeth, so I have been undergoing one tooth renovation a year.
My dentist has brought me to the final stages for a new crown. Next week it should be cemented in place, hopefully for years to come. In the process, we did a root canal, a crown lengthening, repair of a molar next to it, and then creation of a post to hold the new crown. To protect the post, and to keep the tooth from shifting, I’ve been wearing a temporary crown for the past few weeks.
The night of the wedding rehearsal, it popped off. The dentist and I couldn’t meet up, so I did without until Monday morning, when she glued it back in place. Last night…..

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I love words. I’m always up to learn new ones. I thought I might learn a new one today when I was listening to WGN Radio. Judy Markey was talking about hearing a word that she had never heard before. She’d read it in a newspaper earlier this week, and then one of the sports announcers covering the Cubs game, Tuesday night, used it. The word was “scrum.”
Dictionary.com defines scrum as:
A play in Rugby in which the two sets of forwards mass together around the ball and, with their heads down, struggle to gain possession of the ball.
Or: A disordered or confused situation involving a number of people.
I knew the sports definition for “scrum,” but I didn’t know it had a non-sports connotation. The announcer was describing the mob on Waveland Avenue outside Wrigley Field in Chicago. As a home run was hit over the walls of the field into their midst, he said a scrum of people reached for the ball.
DH says scrums are what you get when you eat crackers in bed. (rolling eyes) That might be the last time I read my blog to him.

The soybean fields around our home have been harvested this week. In place of the even rows of tobacco-colored plants we have biscuit-colored fields that have been buzz cut. The geese are busy gleaning beans that were dropped or left behind, readying themselves for the long commute to their winter homes.
We have seven fairly good sized ponds within half a mile of our house. As the subdivisions have been developed, the ponds have been increased in number and size to handle the run off during heavy storms. The ponds connect the bean fields and the forest preserve, so we tend to see a lot of wild life. The deer use our lot as a runway between Federal land and forest preserve.
We have a few geese around throughout the summer, but in October, it’s like a tail gate party. This morning at 10:00, if I could have stepped from goose to goose, I could have made it around the last pond without ever touching the ground. We enjoy hearing them chatter amongst themselves, and watching them practice their flying wedges.
All too soon they’ll be gone and the cold will settle. I love Indian Summer!

I have the Beatle’s song about birthdays running through my head. Today’s my birthday. We’re not planning a rousing celebration; rather, it will be a laid back day.
One of my nieces and her boys have been coming to dinner every other week. We’ve been trying to get together for the last two weeks, but she has had a virus, and didn’t want to share it with us as we prepared for the wedding last weekend. Soooooo….I think she is finally well enough to join us.
I plan to make lasagna, a big salad and garlic bread. And there’s this package of devil’s food cake mix, and some fudge frosting that’s been calling to me……
Usually we celebrate our birthdays by going out for dinner, but this week is pretty tightly booked. A few years ago I started telling my mother that we should all fly down to New Orleans to have dinner at the Courtyard of the Two Sisters. I tease her about it every year, but I haven’t gotten her to budge. Don’t you think it would be wonderful to hop a plane for a candlight celebration?
Where would you go to celebrate?

I was reading my mail before getting the day started today, and came across a message from a friend, telling me to go to this site. An artist in Iowa has created a memorial to our military that you might like to see.