Down in the weeds

I tuned in to my HOA’s landscaping committee meeting earlier that month, which is 70 minutes of my life that I’ll never get back.

I attended because I wanted clarification on what our landscape maintenance contractor is supposed to be doing about back yards. We’ve had three companies in the past four years; the previous one was only contracted to come into our back yards twice, during late fall, to blow leaves. By the time they got to mine for the first round, there were foot-high drifts of leaves and sycamore bark. I’m not sure whether they did the second pass at all.

But this crowd hasn’t been in my back yard all year. They’re here weekly during growing season, but they only mow and blow in the front yards and the common areas.

So I asked—when can I expect someone to attend to the growing piles of leaves in the back yard?

The hand-flapping chair of the committee asked me if I was leaving my gate open? No—because I have no back fence, therefore no gate. It's wide open. As they'd know if they ever walked behind my block of townhouses. Which they have not.

Well, the HOA president (who has ubiquitous tendencies) butted in to inform us that the workers are supposed to mow, trim and blow in open back yards every other week. Which they have obviously not been doing.

Yay.

However, in the course of the meeting for as long as I stuck it out, someone commented on the need for the contractors to address the weeds—which they obviously are also not doing. And I was reminded of this last week when I noticed this weed:

I mean—no banana for scale, but that’s a weed of substance, right there.

I have no weeds, because the leaves act like mulch to suppress anything that's even thinking of growing. 

(Contractors were out yesterday and back yard still ankle high in leaves. I’ll have to put in a ticket in the property management portal.)

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Creeping up

Well, Wegmans is anticipating the season.

I mean, kinda? They’re chimineas, but they look distinctly Halloweeny.

(And it's interesting that you can get whoever set up the display arranged the lids symmetrically.)

Still, they’re not a patch on Costco, which has had Halloween yard décor out for three weeks.

 

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

Gratitude Monday: It's there if you look

Some days your gratitude is macro; some days micro. Today’s the latter, but I think it’s also the former.

One recent morning on my walk, I was struck by the elegant arrangement of three roses on their bush. So of course I shot a photo.

There’s something about the formation of the pink flowers against the green shrubbery and the subtle curve to the right that just hums. I'm so grateful to have this kind of thing all around me.

You don’t have to stop to smell the roses, but it’s worth your time to pause to appreciate what they’re giving you.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Not in the least bit scared

Well, this week’s breaking story is that the Kleptocrat’s departure from a NATO meeting last month in Ankara involved him ditching not only Bribe Force One in the face of alleged threats from Iran (because, you know, he’d just ordered resumption of the bombing), but also him slinking off the backup Air Force One—in a catering truck—to a third plane, leaving press, aides and cabinet members to face whatever the Iranians might throw at them. Diaper lady Natalie Harp, indicted co-conspirator Walt Nauta and longtime toady Dan Scavina joined him in the food service truck—which must have been really cozy—and flew with him in the non-descript C32 to the UK. On the ground there—with everyone aboard AF1 ordered to keep their window shades closed—they schlepped him back to the big plane, whence he emerged as though he’d made the journey in that craft.

You need to know that what we know as Air Force One only takes that designation when the president is aboard; as soon as Bonespurs crept into the catering box, that 747-8 was no longer AF1 and the C32 should have taken that designation the instant he shuffled aboard. But because the leader of the free world was terrified, the decoy plane retained the AF1 designator while the C32 apparently had no call sign.

The legacy AF1 craft (unlike BF1) is equipped with all defensive countermeasures, so the passengers had all the protections that accompany a sitting president. But they were still serving as decoys, intended to draw any fire the Iranians might send up to a plane presumed to be carrying their nemesis, so their trip could have been a lot more entertaining than they’d been led to expect.

But I’m sure they’d be happy to know that their potential deaths were in the service of his safety. And the memes that permeated the Internet have been cherce.

So, anyway—today we’re having “The Tale of Sir Robin”, from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. For no particular reason, really.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Picking peppers

I went to the local farmers market last Saturday specifically to buy a tomato that was somewhat in the environs of being ripe so I could make tomato-basil mayonnaise. While I was there, I came across this pepper:

I’ve never seen anything like it, so I bought it.

Here’s what it looks like in the interior:

The taste was muted and it didn’t have the crisp “snap” of a green bell pepper, so I’ll probably not buy it again (unless I’m doing something that requires a variety of colors). But it was worth a shot.

 

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

 

Not aroma therapy

Some months ago—don’t know when, precisely, but apparently it was pre-Christmas (as will become clear)—I saw a four-pack of Meyer hand soap on sale at Costco. I like their product, although I’d only ever had the lemon-scented stuff, so—without really looking at the package—I popped it in my cart.

When, some time in April or May, I pulled one of the bottles out and started using it in my kitchen, it smelled to me like celery. I thought celery was an odd take on hand soap, and when I actually looked at the label, it said it was pine.

Well, I’m here to tell you that only by stretching my imagination to its outer limits could I connect that scent to pine. It actually smelled manufactured and chemical and it was weird the entire life of its contents.

Then this week, it finally ran out, so I went to the package. The remaining choices were “Gingerbread”, “Peppermint” and “Snowdrop”. Obviously some kind of holiday promotion, and I don't know what I was thinking when I bought it.

With some trepidation, I pulled out the gingerbread.

I cannot describe to you how nasty this is, and how awful it smells on your hands. Because I use it in the kitchen, it stays on my hands while I’m prepping meals and still befouls them when I sit down to eat. I’ve taken to finishing off a hand wash with a swipe of dish washing liquid.

I may end up sending this wholesale down the drain and hope that it doesn’t form some kind of clog.

And I’m really afraid of the “Snowdrop”.

 

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

 

Coming up short

An interesting thing occurred while I was making peach ice cream. The recipe called for 2.5 cups of heavy cream. So I emptied a full pint carton of cream into my liquid two-cup measuring cup.

All my life I’ve understood that two cups equals a pint, so I expected the cream to come to the top measure of the container. It did not.

Interestingly, it didn’t even come to the milliliters stated on the carton (473). I reckon it measured less than 450ml.

Wegmans—you got some ‘splaining to do.

  

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Gratitude Monday: Peachy

I probably heard about The Peach Truck on Reddit in June. I immediately went to the site and ordered a 12lb box for pickup in nearby Sterling on 3 July, their first distribution of the season. I’d already signed up for a fruit CSA, which has delivered mixed results; their peaches in particular were disappointing, so I took the leap of faith.

Naturally, 3 July here was three-digit hot, and also the Federal holiday. My air conditioning was on full blast for the entire 10 miles out and still never really made a dent. And the traffic—even making the turn into the exit lane for Lowes (which shares a parking space with a Walmart and a Sam’s Club) was unbelievable. I was heartened to see a gigantic orange semi labeled THE PEACH TRUCK, but disheartened to see a line waiting for the distribution.

I did mention the heat, right?

However, the line moved quickly and my QR code got me a smallish orange box.

(There were people there with wagons, hauling away multiple 40lb cartons. They were clearly veteran peachers.)

It took me about 15 minutes to get out of the parking lot—seems like the world and his wife were all either picking up peaches, getting some DIY stuff or stocking up on retail goods stacked high and sold cheap.

To tell you the truth, I was concerned, because when I got home, the peaches were hard and they had no scent. No different from what you get down to the Giant. But almost immediately an email arrived, with instructions. Set them out, stem-side-down on the counter for a couple of days. They will come to fruition.

Well, I did.

And so did they.

The first one I bit into was firm but so juicy I had to wash my face after eating it. I could not wait to make fresh peach pie.

It’s been at least 20 years since I’ve made fresh peach pie, because you have to have absolutely fully ripe, luscious peaches to make it. So I was a little rusty. My first effort was a little less than aesthetically pleasing:

But it tasted fine.

Let me just say this: once you’ve peeled a peach, it is unbelievably slippery. You have to keep a nimble but firm grip on it if you want to slice it.

I then made tarts, which are easier to give away.

Pro tip: although the recipe says to “mash” some fruit to go into the glaze, you really have to purée it to eliminate little bits. (Well—maybe if you strained it?) And I discovered that my old Cuisinart food processor still didn’t get the job done, but the NutriBullet I won at a company health day nine years ago was perfect. (That was on the third round.)

Also—for tarts, cutting the peaches into chunks instead of slices makes it easier for the glaze to permeate the surface.

After I gave a couple of tarts to a friend, she and I went halves on the second (and final) peach distribution, which I picked up at the end of July.

Another round of tarts and an attempt at peach ice cream. That was less successful, for one technical reason (pro tip: do a trial run setting up the ice cream maker before you really need it) and also because it just didn’t taste peachy.

I might try it again using frozen peaches. Or I might just write it off.

Anyhow—I used up the last of the peaches yesterday. The season is over.

And here’s my gratitude: wonderful, delectable, juicy, luscious peaches once again. The season is short (which helps me focus; another point of gratitude), but Lordy, is it amazing.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

Turning away our yield

A friend and I went to lunch at a diner yesterday because she had a hankering for a BLT. I didn’t want to tell her, but what with the (fatal) cyclospora outbreak, recalls of pork products and salmonella being found on tomatoes, her sandwich might just be a couple of slices of bread with a pickle on the side.

Unless there’ve been issues with pickles lately.

(In the end, she had the brownie sundae. Good choice.)

Between the tariffs and insane Iran war driving up costs, mass deportations of migrants depleting the workforce in the fields and processing plants, and tossing away regulations and oversight on safety standards, our once-vaunted food supply chain has seen some things. That’s on top of human-induced climate change playing havoc with agricultural cycles.

Yay, us.

So today’s earworm is Nanci Griffith’s “Trouble in the Fields”. She's more optimistic about the outcome, but then she wrote it in the 90s. Bon appétit.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Well, hello, August

If you want to know how the weather’s going, here are a couple of pix of the view through my back windows:

In a word: ugh.

 

 

©2026 Bas Bleu