Last night I did a ZOOM reading from my new book ON THE WAY OUT, TURN OFF THE LIGHT followed by Q & A for the magazine DIre.  It was fun and you can watch it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc116RBurrk

We had some rain this week. Twice! Never very much, but any amount is a great improvement.  We lost power during high winds in the second time.  Wednesday night was the first night in some time I could open the windows and sleep without air conditioning.  The cooler, drier weather is a joy, the kind of days I love in fall.  Some trees are turning very early – our biggest sugar maple has already lost much of its leaves.  But the beech hasn’t shown any sign of its fall plumage.

Some books I was due from Knopf/Penguin/Random House went to an author in Canada.  We are trying to figure out how to get them to me now.  Publishing is a cold mess – nobody there.  At least my new book is on Amazon, ON THE WAY OUT, TURN OFF THE LIGHT.  And the audio book I recorded over three days is also on sale.

 We’re enjoying the last of our tomatoes.  My paste tomatoes are already gone, but some of the main crops are slowly producing greenies.  We are still getting peppers-- frying and stuffing and hot, although the fiery ones are not as hot as they were a month ago, and small eggplants.  So far the cole crops I started inside and planted are thriving and the lettuce seeds have almost all sprouted, as did the radishes, Chinese giant red mustard and arugula. I brought in a few radishes for supper—salmon with pesto, rice and beans Woody picked yesterday morning.

 We’re going to dinner tonight after the Preakness at friends’ house in town.  We will eat out on their deck. It’s a mother and daughter who are very careful.  Dale and Stephen will be there too.  All of us at a big table with a heater on if necessary.  Last weekend we had a lot of furnace trouble.  It had een cleaned and thenext day it wouldn’t start.  We called the oil company who put in that furnace and maintains it.  On the third day and the third workman operating on the furnace, it finally seems to be fixed – we  hope. 

 The people next door [they came in early March from Brooklyn and have stayed with their daughter ever since] have lost their cat.  I hope it wasn’t eaten, like happened to Max many years ago.  People have to be careful with their pets.  We have coywolves [who killed Max] and fisher cats so called, big weasels who kill anything. They’re fierce.

‘I have been potting plants that should come inside.  I’ve brought in five rosemary’s, chives, two basils [those I did first, as basil doesn’t like even coolish weather], a couple of red flowering begonias, my larger and smaller bay trees and many young aloes that Woody saved.  I have many more tender plants to go, some that have been growing in pots and simply need to be carried in and several that must still be potted.  I think I’ll leave two rosemary’s in the herb garden and try to protect them to overwinter in place. We have a limited amount of space for houseplants.

 I had a brief mention of the book in the NY Times and a review in the Boston Globe. It is a good strong book. Also getting a lot of good responses on FB. 

 As we have far far fewer flowers than we used to since I can only garden is raised beds, Woody has been building a new narrow raised bed area against the east side of the main garden for flowes that will attract bees to pollinate our veggies and fruit.  I have been researching what bees like.  Tomorrow we plant some fall bulbs, tulips, daffodils and Grecian windflowers that came Friday from Fedco.