This past Saturday, I hopped in 'The Hoss' to run some errands and check out the American Artisan Festival at Centennial park. Even with no air conditioning in the truck, I thoroughly enjoyed driving The Hoss around town. Having 8 cylinders of power under foot is fun. The pull of the gears keep begging for higher speed, and the momentum of such a big hunk of metal... well, it puts a big smile on my face. It's a good thing I'm not able to drive the truck all the time. There might be a lot of speeding tickets and the amount of petrol burned up by that thing would not be so good.

Anyway, so I stopped in at the Artisan Fest, and found it to be almost an exact repeat of last year. I did run across one booth that really caught my attention and drew me in. What I saw first was an large etching of elephants dancing in various ways. (That description doesn't do the picture justice.) For some reason, it nearly made me tear up. The artist was David Bigelow, and the combination of his talent and wit made his work delightful. His use of word play and alternative perspective is reminiscent of Gary Larson. His work reminded me a little of some of the stuff I come up with, so I chatted with him a bit. In a roundabout way, he encouraged me in my own artistic pursuits (encouragement is always nice), and I ended up buying a piece that makes me smile and prods me a bit every time I look at it. (A sign in the picture says 'absolutely no thinking outside the box' as a cat pauses outside its litter box.

Sunday night, I roasted broccoli, potatoes, and summer squash for supper, all from the garden. I kicked myself afterward, remembering that I could have added carrots to the mix. I also harvested some of the 'Blue Jade' corn which wasn't very blue at all. But it was fun to eat. Would make a nice, odd little hors d' oeuvres or something. You would have to eat about ten of them in order to feel like you actually ate something.

I think I might have a phosphate deficiency in the garden. (I need to start doing soil tests.) My potatoes didn't flower and are dying out (curling brown-edged leaves), so I probably just need to harvest them now. I pulled one plant out, and found about 6 potatoes buried. It seems like a miracle to be able to plant one little ball of potato and pull several more bigger ones out of the ground only a few months later.

Last night I finally took advantage of the cool evening weather and started pulling out some of the grass that is making my jungle of a garden even more jungly.

Oh, and I have been reading the Encyclopedia of Country Living by Carla Emery that my mother sent me for my birthday. Inspirational, overwhelming. I keep reminding myself that all I need to do is take one step at a time.