Well, it's barely mid-week and I already made myself a long list of things to do this weekend. Sigh.

When I got home from work, I went out with a bowl to see if I could pick off some ripe wineberries. Looks like another banner year for them as they envelop my property from nearly all sides. I only picked enough to top my breakfast cereal in the morning. But I think more should ripen by the time the weekend comes. I hope to pick as many as possible and freeze a bunch for winter.

My membership in the CSA this season is forcing me to cook things I don't usually cook. Like, I know beets are considered a "super food," but if I bought them in the past, they'd be pickled in a jar. Not bad, but not very fresh.

So last Sunday I got 4 good sized beets with my haul, but also the tops. I went online to my default recipe source, food.com, and tried out a simple recipe where you basically just cook raisins (plumped up with boiling water first), walnuts, garlic and scallions with the shredded beet greens, just long enough to wilt the beet greens. BOY, WERE THEY GOOD. The sweetness from the raisins took away the sometimes bitter taste of greens. I could have eaten a lot more of them, cus once you cook them down, what looks like a huge pile of leaves ends up being much smaller.

I may just email the recipe to the farmer's wife. And I've been toying with the idea of volunteering my time to help them write a newsletter going out to all CSA members, which I believe is over 100 families. I know they can't pay me, but I am so into the whole CSA thing, plus I love to cook and try new recipes. The person who did something like this before moved to Maine, so at the moment they are "newsletterless."

Plus, being a writer, this stuff comes easily to me. I was also wondering if they've ever done a survey at the end of the season to ask people, for instance, to name their top 5 vegetables they'd like to get in the CSA and what they thought of the program in general.

But, it is a commitment and I don't want to start something I can't stick with. I seem to always be going in a hundred different directions.

Last weekend was nearly all "chores" and not much "fun" stuff, save for an early Sunday evening walk on my favorite paved walking trail here in town. I've done that walk a zillion times before but I enjoyed it so much nonetheless. I had the place mostly to myself. The meadows reminded me of famous Andrew Wyeth's painting, Christina.

So, back to my produce. I still have a bunch of kale and 5 zucchini/yellow squash to do something with. The problem is, during the week i'm usually too tired to do any fancy cooking but yet i hate to leave farm fresh produce linger in my fridge all week. I wish I could get my produce earlier than Sunday afternoon, cus by that time, well, I'm running out of weekend time to do some cooking.

Due to the extreme high humidity, i haven't walked on my lunch hour all week; instead, I've gone to sit, or recline, actually in my car with the radio on.

Last weekend I spent some time researching the cost of cable TV with either Charter, AT&T or Fios. They all offer even the cheapest TV at a far higher price than I want to pay. When I gave up cable in 2010 (post-layoff), I was paying just $18 a month for it! Now, even if you get it as part of the threesome package with phone and Internet, you're still paying $30 a month and usually just for a year or two and then you have to renegotiate the whole thing again. I absolutely HATE having to do that, as is the case now with AT&T for my phone and internet. I'm quite sure they're counting on your not bothering to do that or not having time or being lazy or whatever so you wind up paying the higher price after the promo rate is over.

For now, I guess I'll stick with plain old, limited Hulu. The only shows I watch regularly are:
* House Hunters
* The Bachelor/The Bachelorette
* So You Think You Can Dance
* American Pickers

What I miss the most is:
* My local news stations
* American Idol
* HSN, I'm embarrassed to admit. As a marketing writer, I'm fascinated by their sales pitches and how they pull you so that before you know it, you've just got to have the latest whatever it is they're selling.
* Channel 13

Little by little I am doing the things I'm required to do as a new employee. Working for such a big company, it's frankly ridiculous to have such a complicated mountain of stuff to read and do, but of course it's all mostly necessary. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to set up my direct deposit. Then on Thursday I should be able to do some other things, like health insurance (won't be able to switch til Sept 1) and my 401k elections. Then of course I'll have to get through a pile of Group Learning Modules, which are self-directed online courses you have to take each quarter. I've been doing them all along; even as a contractor you're required to take them. Kind of a pain. There was one I flunked and so I have to retake it until i Pass. Yikes.

Oh. Last night, I found my new Frigidaire dehumidifer sitting on my front doorstep, delivered via Amazon.

I managed to get it out of the box and into the basement. Plugged it in, turned the power on and it started right up. There was next to nothing I had to do, which is the way I like it. Thus far I am using the container you have to empty once it fills up cus I only have one laundry sink down there and I have decided that yes, I will also get the DeLonghii dehumidifer repaired....another chore this weekend to drive it 50 minutes to New Haven where the authorized repair guy is.

The basement floor is STARTING to dry out; I'll have to remember to empty that bin in the a.m. before I go to work so it doesn't stop working all day when I'm away.

When I get the DeLonghii repaired, I may run both down there but I may also need to get an electrician over here to put in another electrical outlet in the corner of the basement where I want to put the Frigidiaire. I have to search down there first to see if there's one I haven't noticed before. Would be nice if there was one. You're not supposed to use an extension cord and since I do worry about things like fires, I won't do that....

Here's some not very good pix of the ailanthus tree that was taken down last weekend.

http://www.savingadvice.com/blogs/image.php?blog=3743&id=12651

http://www.savingadvice.com/blogs/image.php?blog=3743&id=12650

Photos used to be so easy to do here and now I'm having trouble. Something has changed.