Summer Celebration -- The Gift That Keeps On Giving

Nice tomato harvest.  Not so nice phone-camera shadow...

So, Saturday, I cleared out the tomatoes from the garden and the haul wasn't bad (see above), but it wasn't *anything* like what I'm used to seeing this time of year.  I'd been blaming the crazy overcast May, June, and even minor rain in July, but finally, on this harvest, moving between the plants, even without sufficient weeding, I could tell that something was fundamentally wrong...

Uggghhh... Apparently, our automatic drip system timer died.  Who knows how long ago.  We tested it when we put the plants in, and a few times since, but we haven't really tried it much because it's been so loyally perfect.  Since 2008.  When we bought it.  And now?  It's silent.  The timer can click (which means, open the gates, water should flow) but nothing happens.  After a few minutes of trouble-shooting, I was hopeful that I'd missed something that E could find.  But no.  We came to the same conclusion.  This unit had a good 7 years.  And our garden has not been getting timed water for who knows how long - possibly 8 weeks.  (But don't worry, we still deliver cherry tomatoes to folks when it is important.)
 

Date night with E2 & P at the Grove.  More cleavage than I planned...

 A new timer has been ordered.  Plants that are dried beyond expectation have been watered.  And, for the second year in a row, we went to the Santa Cruz Shakespeare comedy that happened to be playing around my birthday. 

The beautiful SC Shakespeare redwood grove.  Last year for this venue.

Oh, Man.  This production was awesome.  Seriously.  If you think you don't like Shakespeare, as my Shakespeare professor at Cal said -- go to a good production of Much Ado About Nothing -- if you don't like it, you are right -- you just aren't a Shakespeare person.  But I dare you to try to be that person, it is so hilariously enjoyable.

You say birthday cake, I say deviled eggs with caviar.

Meanwhile, I have several friends who ran the San Francisco Marathon and the Big Basin 50K and I was proud of each of them.  Also, E2 and I went and cheered in person for Wharf to Wharf, which was interesting, in that we were somewhere between mile 1 and 2 and it was *very* crowded and folks were slowing down due to back-ups.  This race had previously been on my *to-do* list, but now, after seeing the crowds so long after the start, I'm not sure.  I may be happy to just cheer from the sidelines and deliver goodies to my neighbors.

One lunchtime harvest this week.  No complaints.

In other news, Summer is awesome.  The garden puts out great stuff.

In my complacency, my weekly mileage was a horrid 15.66 on my feet, including much walking.  For the folks who are wondering, yes, I do plan to do a 5K and a 10K in the fall.  I've been fitting in some random decent tempos and intervals, but really, I suck.  I did add 11 miles of biking and another couple of sets of calisthenics to the mix this week (including 20 minutes this AM -- 3X10 pushups, dips, abs, yoga, etc. -- it's gonna hurt tomorrow).

Essentially, I'm relaxed.   Happy.  About to go grab a new book and go to bed.  Ready for whatever next week brings!