Get Me Outta Here!!!

Nature has a funny way of making the unthinkable happen. Take for instance the power of the cucumber. Our cuke plants this year spread through the garden like wildfire. And when it ran out of room...they worked their way outside the backyard. And then last week, I found this curly guy. The cucumber somehow pushed out a panel of our fence as it grew. When it could push it out no more, the cucumber curled around the fence.
Needless to say, it was not easy to harvest this guy. I had to pull apart the fence further and then wiggle the cucumber out.

A Neglected Garden (and Blog)

What kills a garden quickly? No farmer around to take care of it. The combination of McCain campaign embed, two weeks in St. Paul, MN for the RNC, Hurricane Ike, and a couple half week trips to Cleveland, Albuquerque, and Maine have left the poor garden neglected and fading. My boss also mentioned that the neglect has also fallen on my blog.
This weekend, it was time to catch back up and give the garden a little pep before it goes dormant in a couple months. Today, I picked all the ripe tomatoes, a bell pepper, and two cucumbers. I also cut off damaged tomatoes and some bell peppers attacked and eaten by ants.


I figure the more I can trim and pick off, the less the plants have to worry about supporting.
It had been a good month since I fed the plants, so I took 30 minutes to do that as well. Hopefully with a fresh supply of food and cooler, dry temperatures, the garden can come back alive and give us some more goodies before Thanksgiving.

The Basil Was In A Bad Need Of A "Haircut"

Hanna In The House

It may not have been great for the folks in the Carolinas, but we needed the heavy rains the tropical storm brought to the Capital Beltway. Come tomorrow morning, I'll be out in the garden to do a lot of pruning, weeding, and feeding