. The season's first zucchini.
Plenty more where that came from. (I picked 2 more this morning.)
And these are spaghetti squashes forming.
This afternoon I start training (1 day) for the next round of Census work, which I understand largely consists of "reworking" residences previously enumerated as "vacant" or uninhabitable."
Dealing With the Heat
Haven't done a whole heck of a lot these last 5 days, due to the heat wave. It was 98 yesterday and very high humidity each day. I dragged a chaise lounge down to the dank basement and sat there reading and talking to my cats. Then I studied the long workbench I have, painted a dark green many years ago. I also observed the many cans of half used paint sitting on the workbench.
I grabbed a paint can dated 1/96 and painted the workbench white. Much better, though it could use a second coat.
Yesterday morning at 8 a.m. I helped my neighbor clean out her garage, 2nd day of doing so. She went through about 5 boxes of boxes which she agreed to donate to the library. I carried them in for her, and then we disposed of other stuff at the dump. It feels so good to de-clutter, even when it's not my stuff!
An Unintended Consequence of the Cash for Clunkers Program
I got my car tax bill for about $85. One of the small rewards of driving an older car is tht each year you keep it, your car tax is smaller. The car tax is based on 70% of the car's retail value, derived from nada.com website, multiplied by the mill rate. But I noticed the car tax this year was actually HIGHER than what I paid last year, by about $5. That can't be right, I thought. If anything, it should be less.
The tax assessor gave me an interesting explanation for that. The federal Cash for Clunkers program resulted in thousands of older gas guzzlers being taken off the road when they would have otherwise been sold to other people. This resulted in the value of other older cars, like mine, increasing! Damn.
You're Beautiful, Now I'm Going to Eat You
July 8th, 2010 at 01:21 pm
July 8th, 2010 at 01:42 pm 1278596542
July 8th, 2010 at 02:06 pm 1278597964
July 8th, 2010 at 02:58 pm 1278601080
July 8th, 2010 at 03:14 pm 1278602077
These last few nights, I've run it from about 7 pm to 10:30 pm, when I go to sleep.
July 8th, 2010 at 03:15 pm 1278602149
The first one I simply sauteed in some olive oil and it was pretty bland. I also like to roast zucchini slices, but it was way too hot to do that last night.
I have a recipe for stuffed zucchini, but it's too much work!
July 20th, 2010 at 02:33 am 1279593204
July 20th, 2010 at 11:54 am 1279626855