Spaghetti Squash

 What's for lunch? Spaghetti squash.

 Yesterday I picked our first. Actually, I picked one a few weeks ago and Tom took it to a mutual friend in Cincinnati. My one plant appears to have about a dozen of the squash on it at the moment. So time to get busy with the larder and fix lunch.

I split the squash lengthwise from "stem to tail". That's a risky operation seeing as how the skin of the squash is a bit tough and the knife has to be huge. I cut off the stem first, giving me a flat surface to sit the squash upon (in the sink). Others hold it by a towel while they split it.

 Here is the squash split lengthwise. I'm ready to scoop out the seeds and "guts".

 With the seeds removed, the cavity is hollow. I then applied a little vegetable oil to each half and laid them on a non-stick cookie sheet (Mom added parchment paper to avoid clean-up).

 The two halves are laid face down on the cookie sheet and baked for an hour at 400°. Test with a sharp fork stuck into the skin. It should pierce fairly easily.
 In reviewing past years, I see that I baked these face-up. That's probably a better choice.

 Here's the finish meal. Mom said that she thinks the strands would have stayed together better had I not left the squash in an extra 15 minutes (1:15). The squash was a bit overdone. The taste was excellent, though. I prefer mine with butter and salt. Mom thinks she would prefer marinara.

 Here's a previous post about spaghetti squash: click here.

The Harvest

 Yesterday afternoon I was washing windows when I heard the sound of a harvester in the field across from us. At first I never know where the sound is coming from - near or far - and then a monstrosity will pass the house, dust lifting in all directions and the puzzle will be solved.

 There is a sadness that comes with it: another growing season ended. This is also the season of insects ... ladybugs, stink bugs, cluster flies. It is a mad dash now before the weather turns cold ... harvest! hide!

 But it also a time of completion, the taking in of these great loads of beans and grains. And the mechanical monsters that thread these fields give me hope for the future of mankind. It is a stretch of the imagination that the tiny soybean can be separated from stalk by clanking metal. And yet they gather in great loads, un-mashed, lifted into waiting trucks.

 Last evening, as the sun was setting, D R Coffman moved his harvester from the field east of us to the one south. Here he is on the beginning row. How wide the mouth of this machine! It voraciously swallows many rows of plants in a single swath, throwing the chopped plants back onto the soil, collecting the soybeans for later.

 Luckily there is no wind. The dust settles quickly, falling back to the ground without covering my newly-washed windows in fresh dust.

 The first few corners are a challenge and yet D R has done this for so many years that he seems to simply drive without thinking. Everything he does is with a fluid motion.

 South of the harvester sits a bin which he'll fill again and again. Later, after dark, he parked the harvester and all was quiet. I'd have expected him to keep going through the night but, with rain still days away, I suppose there is no hurry. It is now 9:30 am the next morning and the equipment hasn't moved. I'm sure D R is catching up on some rest before beginning again.

 Later today I suspect it will be done ... the fields newly leveled and our view expanded in three directions. Another sixty days and the ground will be white and this will be no more than a memory. The beans, I guess, will be in China, or turned to oil or to feed.

 Next spring we will have corn in all directions. That is my favorite, a natural privacy wall that surrounds us as it grows. That is what I look forward to.

Jane's Saddlebag

Yesterday (09/12) was the first day of the annual Amazon.com picnic for CVG-7 and CVG-5. Tom works at CVG-7 and signed us up to attend. It was down in Boone County Kentucky, just a stone's throw from the Ohio River and within sight of Indiana. It's a bit of a drive ... down I-75-71, exiting near Florence and then continuing west through the "boonies".

The picnic was held at Jane's Saddlebag in Union, Kentucky. We arrived about 1 pm and stayed perhaps an hour and a half. Much of our day was spent in driving. The location is in the Big Bone Lick area and near the same-named state park

.

Amazon's Annual Picnic was both September 12 and 13

We had our choice of days to attend

 Parking was in that field at the base of rolling hills. The setting is beautiful though cell phone service is minimal.

 On the same side of the road as the parking is a petting zoo ... not open while we were there. The side of the barn is covered in signs.

 Closest to the entrance is this "Whine Shoppe" and ...

... the General Store.

 Behind them are a number of smaller structures that would mostly be of interest to children.

 There is an amphitheater behind the main building which, I imagine, is a great setting for concerts. With the bowl-shaped land surrounding it, acoustics must be wonderful. The setting would be particularly beautiful on a clear, starry night.

 These fishermen were on the Big South Fork, a large tributary that empties into the nearby Ohio River. There is a marina nearby Jane's Saddlebag.

Big South Fork - looking east

 Recent rains had left the ground muddy and soft. Tom kept his distance but I walked as close to the water as the weeds grew ... and felt myself sinking as I stood there.

Bill and Tom - waiting for the grub to be served

 Amazon conducted a raffle while the food was bring served. Tom had the tickets on the left and won a $10 Kroger's gift certificate. "That's the Sunday paper for the next five weeks," I told him. My non-winner (figures!) is on the right.

 When Tom signed up to attend the picnic, one of the options was for a "meatless menu". Some organizer must have forgotten that step because there was nothing available (grilled) but for burgers and brats. We each made a cold cheese sandwich and piled on condiments.
 They said we could get a grilled cheese and I told them we'd like two. We never saw them. A veggie burger would have been nice, especially since the option was offered. Even so, the food was good ... baked beans, potato salad, brownies and chocolate chip cookies, all homemade and excellent. They also had cans of soda and bottled water. No complaints, really.

 The day was cool (60's), breezy and there were spits of rain in the air every now and then, but nothing heavy enough to spoil the picnic.

The food line

 All in all, a nice day, but I think with a minimal turnout. It's quite a drive for many families, especially with children, but it allowed Tom and I to see parts of northwestern Kentucky we were not familiar with. On the way home we missed a turn and saw more of rural Kentucky than we planned to.

Shadow

Where there is much light

the shadow is deep - Goethe

 I am driving home from Cincinnati on Saturday (09/05) and arriving back in Jackson Township just about 6 pm. Throughout the day the heat and humidity has fired convection and a few towering cumulus build ahead. They are few and far between. I'll soon enough find the pavement wet from a passing shower.

 As I am driving west on Manning Road - just east of Twin Creek - I watch the sky as it seems to pull a cloak across my view. Where the sun was shining in my eyes only moments before, I see a swath of black approach from the north. It is not a cloud; it is a shadow.

 The black cuts the horizon like a knife. Sunshine to the south; black to the north. The pavement seems to darken and disappear.

 Science will say this is no more than a crepuscular ray, a shadow cast by a cloud. I can't argue with that. And yet it is surreal, the sky before me blotted out in real-time. I feel half blind.

 As quickly it pulls back, like a curtain on a stage ... simply gone. But I will remember this.

Lime Fresh Mexican Grill

 We've passed it many times, Tom and I, and I think just as often we've said, "We've got to try that place sometime". Yesterday we did.

 The location of Lime Fresh Mexican Grill we visited is on Calhoun Street, just across from the University of Cincinnati. That explains why most of the tables had college students munching happily away.

I ordered a bean (vegetarian) burrito and a Coke. Tortilla chips and a wide variety of dips (salsa) was supplied at a self-service bar.

 This restaurant has, I think, a clean logo.

 I'm digging in to my burrito.

 There must have been 20 varieties of salsa available and little plastic cups to put them into. I particularly liked the one with pineapple as shown on the front; Tom preferred the more standard salsa with pieces of tomato at the back right. Later I added a green salsa ... perhaps cilantro and lime?

 I forget what Tom ordered but he ate it all, right down to the last bite. I loved my burrito but found it too much for one sitting so I carefully wrapped it in foil and paper ... and forget it when we left.

 My bean burrito ... partially eaten. Lots of black beans a rice. Nicely served in a metal tray.

 The interior of the restaurant is sort of "Mexican cantina". The walls and ceiling are painted a shade of orange.

 The stools have an X with a hash. Tom says this refers to cross-town rival, Xavier.
 Bottom line: Great Mexican food. Very similar to Chipotles and, in my opinion, neither better nor worse, just different. But the atmosphere is better by far and so too are the variety of salsa's offered. We'll certainly be back.

Queen of the Night

And so for nights

we waited, hoping to see

the heavy bud

break into flower.

     "The Night Blooming Cereus"

     Robert Hayden

Our Night Blooming Cereus is again getting ready to bloom. We wait, often, a decade between blooms so this is an event of almost epic proportions. I wrote about this plant in August 2009 (click here to read that blog) and gave its history: this plant goes back nearly a century now.

 The plant last bloomed at the end of July 2009. Actually, it tried to bloom a couple of years ago. Mom bumped the flower and it fell to the floor and both we - and I assume the plant - were too disappointed for another attempt.

 When my grandmother owned this Night Blooming Cereus, she always called it Jesus in the Manger. There are other common names for these members of ceroid cacti: Queen of the Night, Princess of the Night, Honolulu Queen. Wikipedia has a nice entry on this plant. Click here to read it.

 This newest bud began to organize itself on August 13. It begins with a tiny imperfection on the edge of a leaf. It is almost not visible at this stage. Or, as we usually think, it this just another leaf expanding?

 So, now follow below the dated progression of bud to bloom ...

August 13 - the first hint of a bud developing 

August 17 - four days later, it is apparent that the plant is flowering 

August 20 - the bud develops quickly - now there is no doubt

August 24 - early hints of telltale pink begin to infuse the bud 

August 27 - the bud grows heavy enough to hang down 

August 30 - and then it begins to right itself, turning upwards

August 31 - the lovely shade of light pink becomes more evident 

September 1 - the bud continues to lift itself 

September 2 - the bud seems suspended on a goose-neck

September 3 - now the bloom drops to horizontal. "Birth" is tonight?

... and so, on the evening of September 3, the bloom opened. Even in the late afternoon I could see that the end of the flower was slightly opened. Through the remaining hours until dark, the flower expanded, as though it was a white elongated balloon being slowly inflated.
 At 8:30 pm, as I readied to go to bed (and set an alarm as necessary), I shined the flashlight onto our enclosed porch, and there in the dark it was opening its petals. The flower does wait for the dark.

September 3 - about 9 pm 

September 3 - about 9 pm

 So it was 21 days from start to finish. I'm sure the tiny bud we first saw on August 13 was there a few days earlier but too small to be seen (or simply hidden from view). How does a bud go from infinitesimal to this in three weeks? It's an amazing feat of nature, played out on our porch.

September 4 - about 8:30 am - Finished! 

September 4 - the bloom has collapsed in on itself

It's as soft as damp tissue paper and pure white

 Now we return to waiting. Six years? Ten? How long until we see another bloom? There is no hurry with this old plant.

Added later:

 What if we didn't cut the bloom off? I understand the plant will form some sort of red-orange elliptical fruit.that is about three inches long. We'll see ...

September 7