Glass Chatroom Board

This has to be a record. It's been 39 days since the last posting here! I'm just as guilty as everyone else.

Our garden is finally done for the season. We got a pretty good yield of Cucumbers. We were eating them in some form just about every day for most of June & July. Our Roma Pole Beans produced a banner crop, the most we've ever had. We canned 24 sixteen ounce jars of them, blanched & froze 9 more quart bags of them & we're still eating the last of the fresh ones the past 3 days. Another day or two of those to go. We got a lot of Tomatoes, but with issues. I've been growing Early Girl variety for 40 years. We buy our plants from a local greenhouse that raises them all from seed. I think someone messed up this year, because no way were these Early Girls! The plants grew huge very quickly, the tomatoes were numerous, but very small. Most were golf ball size or small lemon size at best. They also had a problem with bottom rot, something I've never had with Early Girls. We had to pick most of them green & let them ripen indoors or they got bottom rot as soon as they started to turn color on the vine. I've never seen Early Girls do that. It's a common problem with a variety called "Celebrity" and I'm convinced that's what these really were. Still, they tasted very good & we've still got some that are ripening. Marsha's herbs did very well & we've got lots of Basil and Parsley.

Don't know if any of you have seen the Silver Alert on Facebook for a missing man from Aroostook County, Maine named Edward Bolstridge. He's one of my cousins. He's 68 years old, has MS plus memory & cognitive issues. He was last seen driving his car near Presque Isle, Maine on August 22nd. No one has seen him since. There's an awful lot of very wild country up there in the county, that can swallow you up very quickly. They have been searching by foot, vehicles, ATV's, drones, planes, helicopters for 18 days & there's been absolutely no trace of him. He had no cell phone or credit cards with him. It's like he vanished off the face of the Earth! He is not a close cousin. In fact, I haven't seen him in nearly 40 years, but still, he's family. After this amount of time, I fear this will not end well.

Other than all that, we're fine here. Leaves are starting to turn (late this year) and the days & nights getting cooler. Won't be that long & we'll be shoveling the white stuff! Hope everyone here (if anyone still is here) are fine.