Well It's All Right

Last night when I was dragging my ass around the kitchen, making us a little supper, I happened to look out the kitchen door which faces west and I had to stop and admire what the sun shining through the dratted chenille plant blooms looked like. They looked electric! I hate these damn plants with all my heart, right up there with crocosmia, but at that moment, it was truly a sight to see. 
Now why and how Maurice crept into that picture, I have no idea. 

There's a close-up. I had to get down on the ground to get that snap but I did it. It was actually far more impressively neon than the picture shows but that will have to do. 

Right now I'm semi-watching a live stream of Gibson's eighth grade promotion which is what they call the graduation. Of course I have no idea where in the crowd of kids he is and you can really only see the front row and I don't even know if the camera is on the portion of the gym that Lily and Jason are sitting in but I don't see them either. I remember going to Owen's ceremony some years ago and how crowded and hot it was but this year, as I think I have mentioned, they are only allowing two guests per child but it doesn't look as if that has made things any cooler as almost everyone in the stands is fanning themselves with a program. 
And the sound is abysmal. 
Now they're all standing up and a girl is singing a very impassioned Star Spangled Banner. 
Okay. I am not going to do a second by second description of the goings on. God forebid.

I have felt better today. Still rocky when I woke up but as the day has progressed I have felt better and better. I went outside to dump the compost and while I was there already, I did my daily garden stroll which of course led to a casual bean-picking. Glen was with me and we made the executive decision to go ahead and pick the first tomato. We have learned our lesson the hard way about leaving an almost-ripe tomato on the vine, only to have it split or be burrowed in by some tomato-loving creature. 

I have read that the best way to ripen a tomato is to put it in a paper bag with a banana to trap ethylene gas but I am not putting a banana in with a tomato because the tomato would probably end up smelling and thus tasting like a banana and that, as The Dude in The Big Lebowski would say, will not stand. 
I don't have a banana anyway. I do have a paper bag though. 

I also found this lovely today.

I have no idea what variety it is. Whatever it is, it is not the one listed on the tag that came with it. I've never grown one like this but I am excited to see it mature. It would appear that it could be anything from a Chinese String eggplant to a Fairy Tale eggplant to a Listada De Gandia. Or something else. Whatever it is, I think it is very pretty and I am sure it will be delicious, cooked in one way or another. 

I spent about two hours this afternoon snapping rattlesnake beans in preparation for canning them tomorrow if all goes as planned. Time to get out that pressure canner! I have no idea how many pints and/or quarts I can get out of what I snapped today. A not insignificant number though, I would say. And the season has just begun! I then opened one of the last quarts of the ones I canned last summer and made a little green bean casserole out of them for our supper tonight. Instead of using the traditional Campbell's cream of mushroom soup in it, I made my own goop with onions, portobellos, a little butter, and 2% evaporated milk. I am not a snob, per se, about Campbell's soup of any kind and let's give it its due- many a family meal was made tastier by a casserole with some sort of creamy Campbell's soup in it as a main ingredient and who among us has not been warmed and comforted by a bowl of their tomato soup with a gooey grilled cheese sandwich?
So speaking of casseroles, I got the cutest little casserole dish, perfect size for two of us, at the Goodwill in Roseland. 

It was made in China, not vintage, but I like it. It's just such a fine little design. And I do love that color. 
Here's what my beans looks like in it.

I have not yet put the French's crispy fried onions on it yet. That will happen during the last minutes of cooking. Does it bother me to use such a processed food for this particular dish? 
Not in the least. What in hell is a green bean casserole without the French's crispy fried onions? 

Life is short. Loosen up. 

While I was snapping beans I watched a few episodes of the new Dan Levy series on Netflix, "Big Mistakes." I had seen trailers for it and it looked like something I would like. Laurie Metcalf, whom I have always admired as an actor, is a quite prominent part of the cast and it looks to me as if she is having the time of her life with her role in it. I like what I've watched so far and Dan Levy is, well, Dan Levy, and that's not a bad thing at all. The premise of him playing a pastor who is not exactly closeted as a gay man but who hides his relationship with his lover boyfriend seems a little far-fetched but it is, as I say, TV. And the big surprise for me was the actor who plays his sister, Taylor Omega. I don't know that she's done a whole lot before this but I suspect we will be seeing a lot more of her. She plays her character, Morgan, as a many-layered thing and I like that. Just when I think I've got her pinned, she strides into a different dimension. Of course the writing has a lot to do with this but even the best writing cannot make up for an actor who cannot stretch and stray into different spaces with her character. 

I say this as if I know anything about acting. 
Well, I do know what I like and what I admire and what I'm simply not impressed with. 

Mr. Moon's had a hard day, all involving mowing. Not only did his lawnmower, which was just back from the shop, stop running due to what looked to him like a fuel line or fuel pump problem, he also lost his glasses which he takes off to put on goggles while he mows to protect his eyes from the dust. Either they are somewhere in the garage stashed where he knew they'd be safe, or else he accidentally left them on the mower and they fell off and god knows where they are. He has searched both garage and yard and they are nowhere to be found. 
He is hot, he is sweaty, he is frustrated, and he is not a happy man. 

*****************

Well, Gibson has been "promoted" and the ceremony is over. It was so much shorter than Owen's was which was way overloaded with speeches made by Leon County School Board dignitaries, etc. I did not see him actually walk past and get his diploma or whatever it was, but I did see him get to stand up and be recognized for his part in the win of the school's science fair in which they got to go to State. 
We are all so proud of him. 

I don't feel especially great about this post. I suppose I'm still a little slow from whatever tiny virus I had and not very inspired by such a low-key day. But it is what it is and we all have our off days. 

Here. I've saved my favorite photo for last. It was taken with the other chenille plant bloom photos. 

And now that I look at it, I'm not sure why I liked it so much. 

Well. La-di-dah. Maurice does look particularly noble, doesn't she?

Love...Ms. Moon