The Annual Canning Melt-Down

To say that I'm under a bit of stress recently would be an understatement.

Somehow, between July and October, I need to develop and deliver three conference presentations (one down, two to go), design a new course, and do the rest of my regularly scheduled work, including a side biz.  I also need to keep up with the garden, since heaven knows I've been fussing and praying about this thing since February, depending on the savings in food expenditures giving us a little cushion through the summer and into the fall.

What this means, however, is that I am canning late at night, and my bravado at how good I am at doing that came to a crashing halt Saturday night with the first disaster and melt-down of the year.

It started when Mr. FC&G and I were taking turns in the kitchen.  The dishwasher was running, dishes were piling up, and I'm trying to rinse vegetables and fill a canner.

Of course, the canner, which I had balanced on the side of the sink, tipped over, hitting the colander of veggies and dumping them into the sink.  I rescued them, rinsed them off, got the canner going, cooked the veggies (extra, just in case of any bacteria from the sink), and filled the jar.

And then the jar wouldn't stand up in the canner.  And then I couldn't pick it up with the jar lifter. And then I started to scream bloody murder. Mr. FC&G, who has been known to observe and participate in a few meltdowns in the factories he works in, calmly asked, "do you need help?"

If I didn't know that he doesn't relish witnessing me have a full scale, blood vessel popping meltdown, I'd still be cleaning pickles off the far wall.  As it was, we got the rack out of the canner, reseated the jar, and processed those $#%& pickles.

They'd better taste like manna from heaven, that's all I have to say.

How Much Does a Garden Grow: June 2017

Have I mentioned lately how much I love June in the garden?

Yes, I know its July already. I'm finally doing the June tallies, and that just reminds me how full of hope June always is. Just look at those lovely Principe Borghese tomatoes in the photo, days from starting to ripen. Just lovely.

June brought with it three notable garden harvest events:

• The blueberry harvest was almost finished by the end of the month, with ounces of blueberries total. Even with some critter damage, that's over half a gallon just from my three little bushes (plus a small one that isn't producing yet). Grand total of blueberry value through the end of June was $25.46.
• I discovered/developed a radish relish recipe I've already shared with you, allowing me to harvest and use more of my crop than ever before. Through the end of June, I had harvested over 20 ounces of radishes, for a retail value of $3.90.
• The first tomatoes came in!  Even though they were only a couple of ounces of Principe Borghese and a single Siletz, both intended as early tomatoes, this is the first time I can remember harvesting tomatoes in June. Let's hear it for starting tomato seeds on Groundhog Day!

July is shaping up to be a whopper.  Fingers crossed; I may even get the garden to profitability, although that's always a dicey hope for July.  Stay tuned!

Cumulative Totals

Total Ounces of Harvest: 107.5
Total Pounds of Harvest :6.71875
Total Value of Harvest: $35.06

Total Expenditures: (-$287.67)

Total Profit (Loss): (-$252.61)

Is Gardening a Subversive Act?

(Note: The illustration is from a product available on my RedBubble store.  Find it here.)

Well, it's summer once again, and the news is full of human interest stories about people being penalized for growing food on their own property. There's the standard array of home owners' associations mandating that people remove front yard gardens and neighborhoods adopting policies that gardens, along with clothes lines, depress the property values. My favorite this year, which I unfortunately did not save the link to, involved a municipality that declared that the right to grow food was something to be bestowed by the government, and, since the government had not explicitly conferred this right, the area homeowners could not garden.

Gardening, in some places, has become a subversive act. And this is the kind of subversion I can get behind.

Think of it this way. Every time you plant something you can eat, you remove a little of your dependence on corporations that produce and distribute foodstuffs. Every tomato you pick from your garden is a little less reliance on a corporate entity to provide your dinner. It also is a little step toward independence in the form of better health. That tomato, grown your way (organically, if you so desire), brings you the kind of nutrition that might help ward off diseases and disorders, freeing you from reliance on healthcare and pharmaceuticals.

This is not to say that gardening is a fix for "everything that ails ya." Most of us would notice if the food trucks didn't come to our local grocer, and most of us will need to take advantage of medical care, even if we eat nothing but homegrown organic produce and do yoga every day.

But, every bit of your own food you grow is one step toward greater independence and less reliance on the impersonal structures that seem to govern our lives. That's the kind of subversive behavior I encourage.