8/10/2008

Is it fall yet?

Summer is one of the hardest times for me to work on the house.  When the weather is nice, i just want to be outside, so I work on the yard.  The yard does need work, of course, but I end up feeling like I'm slacking on house projects.  And when it's hot, the air conditioning is on, and I don't want to do anything to create a lot of dust (sanding), fumes (paint stripping with chemicals, shellacking, or painting), or heat (paint stripping with heat gun).  And so, over the past 3 weeks I've done a whole lot of nothing with the office, stairway, or living room floor.  Go me!

In the meantime, I have been going crazy in the kitchen.  This week's trip to the farmers market yielded 1 small chicken, a dozen ears of corn, a pound of green beans, and 2 lbs of broccoli.  All of those are now safely in the freezer, preserved for the winter months.  I also got some plums, peaches, and cheese to eat now.  I'm thinking of freezing or canning some peaches next week, since I'm off on Saturday and Sunday.  That should be a fun adventure.

I had an opportunity to try some of the corn I froze last week when some dorn that had been gifted to us was shriveled and dry.  After a week in the freezer, the corn tasted as fresh as if I'd just cooked it that day.  It was lightyears better than stor-bought canned.  Lets hope it still tastes as good in 3 months!

One of my days off was spent in Chicago, looking for bathtubs at salvage yards.  We went to 4 places, but none of the tubs fit Shayne.  Plus, they were all hideously expensive ($2200 for a refinished tub?  I think not!).  On the way out of town, we stopped at a plumbing outlet, and Shayne hopped in some new tubs for a test drive.  One thing is now painfully clear: this guy needs a big tub!  The clawfoot fantasy is officially over  :(

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