Onto Tuesday

It rained hard overnight. I heard the thunder on one of my bathroom breaks. But it had stopped by the time I got the Tuesday garbage out to the road.

At lunch, it was cold, overcast and sprinkling. I stopped at Home Depot and bought some flower seeds. I also checked on the price of their Arbor Vitae. The four to five foot-one is a better deal, but hard to get home and harder to dig the hole. So, I think I will get the two to three-foot height this weekend. This will replace that sad old bush I cut out up front.

After work, it was warm and sunny (a dramatic difference from lunchtime) so I changed into my work clothes and went out front. I worked up the front garden soil and then planted my seeds.

I used my Garden Weasel to work up the garden. I had an Italian Uncle who was killed by a weasel, BTW. He was walking down the train tracks and didn't hear the weasel... (Okay, it's an old, perhaps politically-incorrect joke but I'm an old guy...) Then I raked it level.

I planted two packets of Blue Salvia in the back and four packets of Alyssum (two "Carpets of Snow (white) and two of "Royal Carpet" (purple) in the front. Since all the seeds were teeny-tiny, I used an old trick for planting, say lettuce seeds. I mixed the seeds with play sand. It makes sure you spread the seeds out evenly and gives you a visual of where the seeds went.

Then I raked about 1/4 inch of soil over the seeds. The next few days of forecasted rain should help them germinate (unless we have a late season frost, here - then I'm screwed). But, given my reduced income, it's the best I could come up with, rather than spending big bucks on flats of flowers like I normally did. We'll see...

I then moved out to the back patio and did what I should have done last fall. I used the string trimmer to cut down all the dead herbs (trying to avoid the new growth). Then I used my blower to clean out the beds and the patio. I followed that up with the leaf rake, to drag it all out where I could cut up the debris with the riding mower.

I put everything away and was back in the house by 6:45 PM.

Then it was on to tonight's dinner. Now I must admit, I was inspired about this supper by my friend, B___.

I found a recipe for egg salad that sounded good, cut it in half and mixed up four of the hard boiled eggs I'd made last Friday. (Ah, Easter... There's nothing like the smell of PAS food coloring and vinegar in the morning...)

Remember, this originally served four, but my way would only serve two (or one hungry old fat guy). I peeled the four eggs and then rough chopped them (don't use an egg slicer - you want big chunks). I added 1/4 cup of mayonnaise, 1/2 teaspoon yellow mustard and about 1/8 cup of fine sliced green onion (white and green). I seasoned it with salt, pepper and a little paprika.

Here's where B___'s influence came in: Instead of putting this on bread, I pulled off some leaves of Romaine lettuce. I cut off the thick part of the stem, put the egg salad in one end and rolled it up.

It was an excellent, light dinner! Perfect for guys like me who are calorie and carb conscious and religiously watch what we eat! Okay, all kidding aside, this was a fast, one bowl dinner that tasted fantastic.

I watched a little TV, but went to sleep around 10:00 PM.