Green thumbs need not me

Finally getting a bit red

For some reason, my garden knows when I head out of town before springing into action. It was just a few months ago after planting the blasted plants, thinking nothing would happen, that I left for Vegas, and came back to find little tomato plants plopping out of the flowers, and little okras taking shape.

I can't claim I actually know what I'm doing with these things. Sure, I try to keep them wet, and I do go out there to take a look at them every day, but to actually claim that I am giving them the PROPER amount of water, the PROPER amount of feed, the PROPER amount of care... I know not. All of the progress seems to be linked to my not being there.

Mind you, from Thursday through Sunday, my garden saw no water. Indeed, I was later to learn that Austin saw record heat throughout the weekend. So perhaps it is my improper mistreatment of the plants that has booted them into some sort of freak, hearty horticultural anomaly. Who knows, we'll never know. You may notice a lot of brown, dried leaves in the photo. That's the western side of the tomato plants, closest to the fence, so they get the least light. The rest of the plant is green.

I didn't get a picture of the okra, but within the 4 days of waterless misery, no fewer than six okras went from too-small-to-be-picked into too-large-to-be-cooked, so they go to waste. Returned from whence they came. Hopefully I'll get a few picked this week that I can actually cook. The damned plant gets damned prickly, too. Feels like fiberglass.

Speaking of cooking, I went down to San Marcos to the outlet malls in search of a stir-fry pan, which are remarkably hard to find. Considered a "specialty" cookware, apparently, they just aren't as common as, say, a 2.5qt sauce pot. There were, of course, the ridiculously priced $105 stir fries from Calphalon, but I wasn't about to pay THAT. Instead, I headed to the rear clearance section where the overstocks, scratched, and dented were. I found one in decently good condition, with only some minor chipping along the edge for $39, so I nabbed it. It's awesome. One of their "infused anodized" pans, it's semi-nonstick by nature, and not by coating, so I can use metal utensils on it if I want. A good find.