The weather here has turned cooler and we’ve had rain the past couple of days. Not a lot of rain but still the damp feeling is hard to deal with after so many nice, sunny 70+ degree days. It’s too bad that the laundry couldn’t be hung out to dry this weekend. The weather just didn’t cooperate.

My little container garden has expanded. I now have 5 tomato plants (2 of which are heirloom ones that were given to me by a neighbor who has connections to a person with a greenhouse), 1 eggplant, 1 sweet green pepper, lettuce (which is rapidly going to seed with the heat), bush beans, small carrots, sugar snap peas, yellow squash, acorn squash, and a few other veggies. There’s a strawberry plant in a hanging pot. In other pots, I’ve got herbs (parsley, oregano, cilantro, and basil), mint, and catnip (to dry for the cat). It sounds like a lot but it’s really just a little bit of many things in containers. I think I’ve overdone it a bit actually. I’m really hoping that we get regular rains so that I don’t end up having to water it all the time. I do have a small bucket set up to catch water off the roof (my version of a rain barrel). I guess we’ll see how all of it goes.

I’m really glad that I don’t have to worry about mowing the lawn here. It’s hired out and makes it much easier for me as I don’t have to worry about weather issues or fitting it around my work schedule.

Yesterday, I spent from 5-6:30AM at the County Dairy Breakfast helping to do some last minute set-ups. Although the meal looked really good (pancakes, scrambled eggs, muffins, cheese, milk, juice, Culver’s sundaes – strawberry ones, and lots of other little “extras”), I decided to wait and have breakfast in Madison with Matt and Christi.

After leaving the dairy breakfast (they had full shifts and plenty of volunteers to help), I went to farmers market (which was loaded with people who were trying to arrive early and avoid the rain - and nice things) and spent time at the annual “cows on the concourse” event. The “cows” event is small and runs down Martin Luther King Boulevard just off the capital square. There are cows there (along with a large amount of sanitizer gel stations so if people touch the animals they can clean their hands), displays, competitions (scheduled cheese curd eating, milk drinking, grilled cheese eating, cow mooing imitation, cow calling, etc.), and other items. It’s a nice promotion of dairy items and the industry for consumers and other “city folk”. We had grilled cheese, organic ice cream (strawberry and chocolate samples), and milk) for brunch (it was about 10 or so). It’s a strange brunch but it was nice anyway.

We managed to make it to the $5 movies (before noon) at a theater here and saw “Night at the Museum 2” which was nice. Made me seriously want to make a trip to the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC. We’ll see – I shouldn’t be thinking of such things when I’ve just gotten back from vacation.