Tuesday's Tale

It was WARM today! I needed some kitty litter, cat food and cat treats so I went to Kroger at lunchtime. I wanted to grille the steaks I'd thawed out yesterday, so my original idea was to make potato salad as a side dish.

But... they had a fresh load of Florida sweet corn (and you know I'm a sweet corn junkie). I did still buy the celery and the eggs I'd need for potato salad, but I also bought six ears of sweet corn. (Locavore? No way... not when it comes to sweet corn).

When I got home, the garbage was still out by the road, so I switched out the kitty litter. Then I cut up some redskin potatoes and started cooking them for the potato salad. I also put six eggs on to hard boil. BTW, I just heard this the other day. If you hard boil eggs that have been in the fridge a week or more, they are supposed to be much easier to peel. Unfortunately, three of these eggs are brand new.

I ate some large curd cottage cheese with fresh chives, salt and pepper for my lunch. I let the potatoes and hard boiled eggs cool down and put them in the fridge, then went back to work.

BTW, before I left for work, I turned the air conditioner on. It's supposed to hit 81+ degrees F. today.

When I got home after work, I immediately changed into shorts and a T-shirt, grabbed stuff I needed and went out back to finish planting the raised bed garden. As I think I said before, I am planting fewer plants this year, hoping for a better yield (hey, it's a concept).

So, I weeded, and worked in some 10-10-10 fertilizer. Then I planted four tomato plants, four eggplants and four green peppers. I was a little pissed to see that the Roma tomato had a broken stem - but it's got a good root system, so maybe it will grow back. I had raked off the maple seeds and pine needles, so I got a broom and cleaned off the wooden edges of the raised bed. Then I thinned out the lettuce and cabbage seedlings.

About that time, my neighbor Rick came over to show me their new "Puggle" puppy. They had a boxer (that I always secretly thought was a pit bull) and another Puggle. But, the "boxer" died last December and the Puggle had no friends to play with. Cute little puppy!

Then I put out the sprinkler I use in the raised bed garden and watered it for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, I put everything away and then watered all the container gardens and recent plantings. I was going to take a picture of the vegetable garden but couldn't find two good batteries anywhere in the house.

Then I fired up the charcoal chimney and took the steaks (and oh, they were beautiful - one rib steak and one t-bone, both about one inch thick) and let them get up to room temperature. I salted and peppered the steaks. The charcoal was ready, so I distributed it, shut the lid and about 10 minutes later, I cleaned and oiled the grates.

First, I roasted the corn (which had been soaking in water all afternoon). Then I oiled the grille grates again and threw on the steaks. I got a nice crust on the one side, turned the steaks 45 degrees to get some good grill marks and then flipped them over.

Once again I am trying to cook them medium-rare by touch. I have to admit I did better this time, but it's still more medium that medium-rare. I WILL learn this technique!!!

I could only eat about half of the rib steak (the smaller one!) and one ear of corn (a little tough, but tasty).

Then I watched a taped movie ("To have and to have not" with Bogart and Bacall and Walter Brennan). That ended about 10:00 PM and I switched to reading a magazine until bed time.