dinnah....is served...

this is going to be a really long post... but it will be a visual feast...

boy, i was busy tonight! as soon as i came home i was gardening. i wanted to hurry up and transplant my seedlings into the new raised bed planter box today but as you can see, there isn't enough soil. johnny went back to get some more, and even that wasn't enough! i mixed in: two kiddie pools' worth of garden soil (roughly 2 bags each?); a big bag and a little bag of peat; two big bags of plain soil, half a small bag of organic fertilizer; and a big bag of compost with cow manure. and all of this on top of the entire contents of my compost pile. i shall be starting a new, improved compost pile now - hopefully this time with big fat red worms. so anyways, i am just about dying of anxiousness to get this garden going, especially since johnny's family is coming to visit this weekend. i also planted all of the kitchen herbs and the hanging baskets of fuschia.

the herbs you see below are (from left to right): rosemary, stevia, thyme, sage, and catnip.

if you are wondering about the kiddie pool comment above, last year i tried to grow pumpkins on my roof. unfortunately, we had the extremely severe drought and all outdoor watering was banned. so they died. before you wonder why i would let a vegetable garden die, we seriously thought water was going to run out. it was that bad. plus, it was a pain in the ass to try and get up on the roof all the time, especially with my bad ankle. the funny thing is, one plant actually survived. i pulled it out and was surprised to find this:

isn't he cute? looks tasty, too. not sure if i can bring myself to eat it, though. i might just look at it lovingly for a few days. maybe i'll try to re-plant it. now i have big plans for the rest of the yard. i have decided to completely till the triangular wasted space between our houses and plant pumpkins there, along with the beans.

wait, it doesn't end there~! after johnny came back with some batteries (finally!) for my stupid camera, i was able to take a bunch of pictures and start dinner. i took a picture of louie to demonstrate his new whiskerless 'do.




if you click on the picture, you can zoom in and see that he has indeed been trimmed. how goofy is that? dear, sweet louie. moving on...

i promptly began dinner, which was to be a modest sampling of homemade indian fare. i though about trying to make palak paneer like B does, using the mexican crumbling cheese instead of paneer (it works!), but i didn't feel like doing that much work. johnny had marinated the chicken and tofu in tandoori and yogurt all day so all i had to make was the basmati rice, and a side dish - which i ended up making my usual aloo mutter and chana masala. the result was fantastic. and, i just love how vibrant indian cuisine looks!


the chiken and tofu tandoori came out marvelous; johnny grilled them outside. i didn't get a chance to take photos of it because we inhaled them so fast. it was damn good. i love indian food.


the end.

* i lied! here's an exciting update: i may have chickens this week!! i found a woman on craigslist who is selling laying cochin hens and chicks and rhode island reds. i contacted her about getting three hens and four or five chicks, but i need a place to put them!! i need a chicken coop!