Summer updates

In case any of you are on the edge of your seat about how our various summer projects are going, here are some very brief updates. And some other stuff.

tadpoles!

There was either a very localized tadpole rapture while we were on vacation or our allegedly-vegetarian bullfrog tadpole is not a vegetarian at all. Because we left a tank of one big tadpole and two dozen tiny ones and came home to only one big one. He's not admitting anything, but I have my suspicions. In happier news, despite dire predictions he'd stay a boring (murderous) tadpole for up to a year, he's started to sprout hilariously wee frog legs. Nico has taken to running up to the tank and announcing, "Tadpole is funny!" so I guess we'll keep him.



garden!

The ugly garden has received a makeover and the plants are doing well so far. I'm hopeful that my levels of enthusiasm will stay high during the hot weeks of watering that are to come.



I've been posting somewhat regularly over at the garden blog, so further updates will probably be over there.

blog music thingie!

I've been having issues with my playlist widget over there on the right (does anyone even listen to it other than me?) and today there was a little box there that said playback is no longer available. I was kind of losing steam on making a monthly playlist anyway, so I'm going to try putting little tiny embedded YouTube videos there instead. If you click the playback arrow underneath the video, it should just play here rather than redirecting you to a new window. Let me know if you try it and it doesn't work or if it's causing weird annoying things to happen when you view my page. I think I'll be more inclined to swap the music out more often this way because it takes a fraction of the time I was investing in getting those playlists put together. It probably will also mean poor MB sitting through approximately 150% more repeat playings of that ridiculously catchy / cute Lennon & Maisy song, though.

pie success!

Has anyone ever made a rhubarb pie before? I had never even seen rhubarb until about a month ago when one of the volunteers at work brought in a big bag of this stuff that looked like red-tipped celery and said we could all take some. I'd like to know who first looked at this celery-looking crap and said, "Hey! Let's put that in a pie!" Anyway, I knew my mom liked rhubarb pie but couldn't handle the raw plant due to skin allergies, so I set out to make a pie for her for Mother's Day. I used a recipe that Danger found online and emailed to me and the pie got mixed reviews. My dad initially said it wasn't very good (too tart), but my mom later told me it was just fine. I don't tend to like tart things at all, so I didn't try it. I was contemplating making another pie for Dad's birthday today with the rest of the last rhubarb haul (which I chopped and froze), but then the same volunteer brought another big bag in this week. I called Dad's brother's wife and obtained the allegedly-awesome family recipe and made pie #2 last night with the second batch of fresh rhubarb. This one was a success. Nico and I dropped the pie off with a birthday card this evening and Dad called 10 minutes after we left to tell me the pie was really good. High five, family recipe! So anyway, if anyone comes upon a whole bag of rhubarb and wants the recipe, let me know.


(I don't care what you say; that does not look like dessert.)


Reading:  American Canopy: Trees, Forests, and the Making of a Nation by Eric Rutkow

Playing:  Dosage by Collective Soul