Watering, now...

Wednesday morning, I watched the Weather Channel. It looks like this hurricane Alex is gonna hit Mexico, but will dump 6-10 inches of rain where my nephew Rick lives. Sorry about that!

It's supposed to be another sunny, but cool day; Just what I like. So, I opened the kitchen and bedroom windows before I left for work. Now, I suppose some of you are thinking, "Security Alert! Security Alert!" (I know Jake would be). And, yes, some lady was carjacked at gunpoint yesterday in Redford, about two miles from my house (Detroit crime is quickly moving into the suburbs). But, my windows have pop-out stops that only allow the windows to be raised three inches. Since the kitchen widow is about 8 feet above the patio and the bedroom window is in full view of the street, I think I'm okay (unless there's a very tall, very skinny, invisible thief). I hope I never have to eat these words!

I did call the guy at the Volvo dealership and asked him to mail me the receipt and the secret radio code. He called back when I was in a meeting - it's been a crazy day. I have a project that will culminate in 30 outside supplier people moving into one of our facilities tomorrow and they need immediate Internet access - so I'm coordinating having a subcontractor run wires, our WAN Administrator installing a 48 port 10/100 switch I just ordered and had overnighted, creating a VLAN for the Internet access, etc. (I only had five days notice on this one... about par for the course). Anyway, enough of me whining. The guy at the dealership said he'd mail me the papers and the secret code and apologized for not bringing them yesterday.

Back home at 5:15 PM, it was only 71 degrees F., so I left the windows opened. I treated the cats, but didn't change clothes. Since it's supposed to be sunny (and increasingly warmer as the week goes on) I thought I should water some of the gardens.

So, I did...

I dumped about 1/2 gallon of water on each of the four clumps of Sadie's irises I transplanted out front. I suppose I should water the actual whole garden, but am a bit pressed for time, today.

Then I went out back and watered the herbs with the hose. I actually watered all the gardens surrounding both patios. When everything seemed to be watered enough, I took the spray attachment off the hose and stuck it in the reflecting pool. I turned the water on low and let it clean out the wash tub. I think that may be the secret to why my Japanese maple still survives. A heavy application of water may be the trick!

I set the timer for 30 minutes and went back inside at almost 7:00 PM. While that was happening, I took out some fertilizer and worked it into between the rows in the raised bed garden.

Finally, I turned off the water and hooked up the square sprinkler for the raised bed garden. I turned on the water and went into the house, setting the timer for an hour.

I made my dinner, an easy but supposedly restaurant-style, egg drop soup. I used four cups of my homemade chicken stock, putting three cups into a large saucepan and reserving the other cup. I added in 1/4 teaspoon of salt, 1/8 teaspoon of ground ginger and two tablespoons of chopped fresh chives. I brought that to a rolling boil. Then I mixed 1 1/2 tablespoons of cornstarch into the last cup of stock.

In a small bowl I whisked two whole eggs and one egg yolk with a fork. I drizzled the eggs a little at a time from the fork into the boiling stock mixture (Note: the egg should cook immediately). Once all the eggs have been dropped, I stirred in the cornstarch mixture gradually, until the soup was the desired consistency.

I let it cool a bit and then made me a bowl of it. It's funny, the taste is spot on but the color is all wrong (not nearly as yellow as typical egg drop soup in a Chinese restaurant).

I went out in the dark and shut off the water. Back inside, I read my book for a bit and then went to sleep.