More Than Just Veggies

        Here's my basket of  'Million Bells' after a couple of days of thunderstorms and downpours and 1 fall from it's branch.  Not too bad for the experience.  It still attracts the hummingbirds and looks good hanging in the pine tree.  The peppers and potatoes are really blossoming, too!  They say the more flowers you get on the potato plants the more potatoes you'll harvest.  Hope that's true.  The Blue potatoes have lot of flower buds.  I hope I can get a photo when they open!   The blackberry plants have a lot of little berries on them, too.  Just have to fight the birds and creatures for them!
   Right now (11:48pm) the wind is picking up and there are rumbles of thunder in the distance.  This storm has my permission to bypass us...and Fanny's too!  During one of the downpours yesterday I found out that Jeff was right about the rain barrel next to the deck not filling because the gutter had clogged up again when water was gushing thru my kitchen window...and over the window sill with some of it actually going into the sink but most of it running over the counter on to the floor.  I couldn't get the damn window closed fast enough!  It's a wooden sliding window that my mom had put it when she first had the kitchen done back when my parents bought the house.  Real high tech...for 1964...but it's hard to open and close!  I closed it as much as I could and stuffed a dishtowel there to sop up the water that still was coming in.  I had a few not so nice thoughts about Farmer Day...if he thought the gutter was clogged why didn't he do something???  Any way when he got here he closed the window completely...now it's swollen shut and I can't open it at all!...and cleaned the gutter again.  There were a lot of leaves and pine needles that the wind had blown in during these storms.
   Tonight Chef Day was busy putting together a stew that he left on the stove simmering...with me in charge...for supper tomorrow.  It's a beef stew with carrots, onions, celery, corn, broccoli, potatoes and peppers.  My mom always said Jeff put too much in his stew, but boy, did she eat it!  I asked for some chips to go with it.  Let's see if he remembers.  I think it's cooked long enough for tonight.  I'll turn on the burner again tomorrow morning.  It really smells great!