vegetables, festivals, animals

garden update:

fuzzy soybeans...

red lettuce...

(watch what happens to it later in the post!)


taters. clearly dominating the beetles...

cilantro...

troy house update:

unfortunately, not ours, but it's still super to see roofs!

weekend weeding

who knew troy gardens had raspberry bushes? we didn't. they were so scruffy! not that i'd know what one looked like even if it weren't. not before saturday that is. but having spent three hours helping to spruce them up, i can certainly recognize them now...

still pretty scruffy.

wheelbarrows full of weeds.

back to our plot:

the first harvest... we brought out trusty Decision Scissors for the first cut...

(did you think i wouldn't catch this moment on film??!!!)

and this one: the first salad made with the first harvest...a lettuce, goat cheese (or in greg's (i might add, somewhat wimpy) case: feta), tomato, green onion, pine nut, dried cranberry salad.

saturday's next stop: allied drive community festival...

madtown drill team...


for your listening enjoyment...


from afar...

this festival is held each year but this year's big event was celebrating the grand opening of the new boys and girls club.

the old sign...


the old building...

the new building, right next door...

walking around one of the neighborhoods, we spotted this:

greg assured me it was just a pinata.

final stop...

it was that huge sign... and the possibility that we might be able to get american flag-designed pet products.


once inside, there was no such thing in sight, but! guess what i found! now, i know i sort of gave the puppy clothes a hard time, but this is just the cutest! because... well, for one, it's miniature...

and look what it is!
a cat sleep over bag! now if that doesn't conjure up just the cutest, most silly images then something's wrong. i mean, first of all, cats rarely hold sleepovers, but when they do, i just can't imagine them bringing a sleeping bag with, but gosh, i wish it happened more often.


another pet product i just had to showcase, but in this case, for the opposite size reasons...
what kind of dog could possibly manage bones of this size???


turns out, pet wharehouse has pets. lots of them!

now, while i don't like mice coming into the apartment and running around, i do like mice when they are 'domesticated' pets. i just get a sense that they are less germy and less prone to run up my leg catching me off guard.

these guys were super cute!

just look at how much fun they have!woooo!

woah!

they had bigger guys too. i guess this isn't a mouse. but rats can be awfully sweet too. just look at those little hands! and those pink little ears...

now, i have seen scorpions in arizona... light brown, pretty small, thin little poker arms. but i had to come to wisconsin to see this big mama...

now for some non-lethal animals:

turtle...

yellow fish...

cockroach...

shrimp. but i have to tell you, i would not want to be in this shrimp tank. they were all in the middle of a pretty deadly shrimp war. this guy was actually trying to walk off with another shrimp's arm!


chinchilla!

parrot (i think?). he's eating a peanut... that he shelled himself...


baby dinosaurs...so loungy.


snake...

tarantula...
now we get to some of the rather interesting pet products on the market (i'm not counting the cat sleep over bag as 'rather interesting' because that obviously carries with it a negative connotation that i do not wish to convey to such a cute and silly product).

i'm not going to say much about this, except that i saw these once in a cat documentary. this is obviously marketed toward dogs, but i think it's arguably 'not right' no matter what animal you're putting it on. aesthetics aside, it's just kind of... weird.


now... ignore the cute wire-haired fox terrier they used to sell this next product. he was obviously paid a lot of money and you can't fault him for trying to be a productive member of society, but just look at what it is he's selling!
i'm not saying dogs (and cats!) can't use this, but still.

now, these next two products are pretty similar but i'm not really sure what they're for. i guess there's an obvious guess, so are they only meant for diaper pets?

well, i'd hate to end this post with pet hygiene products, so i will add in a couple of other photos to cleanse the palate (nevermind that they are of food)...

i'm not sure which day's lunch this was, but it was so good that gazpacho has become my current favorite soup...

i know gazpacho isn't necessarily tomato-based, but when i say 'gazpacho is now my current favorite soup,' i mean this gazpacho soup. this very soup recipe from mildred's.

and this salad... was a very good salad.

finally, a picture of monona bay...

the end!