kittens, squash blossoms, and stormy Julys.

It felt a lot like fall today, blustery, sudden bursts of smacking rain, bruised sky. Molly, Justin, the dogs, and I went up to my mom's farm to clean the animal pens and see the new kittens (three days old!). They were neat, sharp claws for having no eyes. Kind of squashed looking. But, helpless and easy to hold, unlike most cats. Lilli, their mom, is so sweet, and looks much better without a stomach full of heads and legs poking through her fur. We'll see if we can resist taking one. Probably. Not.
I am thinking about offering Justin a half lease on Maddie. I really don't think I am going to sell her ever. It's just a guilty, expensive task to keep her. So, sharing the load with someone who really appreciates horses might be a great thing. But there are a lot of drawbacks. So, we'll see. I posted her for pretty much free on Craigslist. I'll see the responses I get and talk to Molly's folks about the idea. But I did get my saddle from the farm to clean up. It's in shabby shape. And I got Maddie's bridle, but that thing is run ragged. We'll see how it shapes up with some Neatsfoot Oil and elbow grease. Oh, I also found a sour cherry tree at my mom's today. Bill didn't even know it was there. It was frickin' laden. We picked about 4 cups. But I need to get more. I really didn't want to leave. And that's a rarity for Mom's.

Last thing on this stormy summer day... I picked two male squash blossoms off our acorn squash and zucchini. I pulled the squash penis out of the middle (fine, the stamen, less intriguing sounding though) and packed 'em full of ricotta, thyme, toasted pine nuts, a little salt, and honey. Then fried them in beer batter. Delish. No joke. We'll have to wait for the squash to ripen so we can take the lady blossoms next.

I also looked through a seed catalog and figured out I could spend a substantial portion of my stimulus check getting baby vegetables for winter. Probably not a good idea.

Eleven days until PAT practice one! Feeling pretty good about it. I squatted 205 pounds as a max yesterday. I shoulder pressed 85 (not my proudest number) and deadlifted 210. I did three of Rose's circuits today with light weight (15#) and minimum reps on each exercise. But, I did add in pull-ups and dips, which I hadn't been doing because of my shoulder and elbow, respectively. I finished just over five minutes on the first two sets, and broke five minutes on the last set.

I think I'm going to ask for a pull-up bar for my birthday. Laying a 2x4 across a ladder and the chicken run was not ideal.

I am very pleased with today.