In the Garden Park

The day remained beautiful and sunny when I finally got up around 10. I decided to try something different for breakfast today. Since I had part of a multi-grain loaf of bread left that I bought from the clearance shelves at the Acme last week, I made Almond Multi-Grain French Toast. (Almond because I only had almond extract left, and just a little of that.) Yum, it came out really nice, except for the last one, which I undercooked.

I didn't really know what to do with myself after I finished breakfast. I tried calling Mom, but I never did get through to her all day. I listened to rock and jazz records and did the dishes. That beautiful day was calling me, though. I finally decided to go for a short walk into the park next-door.

Ran into Richard, my next-door neighbor, as I headed out. He was cleaning out his garage. He and his wife didn't know who planted the garden, either. They found it about a month ago, when they saw people going in and out and wondered what was going on. He also said that he had a small metal table I might be able to use in my apartment.

Most of the garden was still overgrown when I strolled in. I avoided the marshy area in the back and concentrated on the already-finished squares. Joining the gourds, teeny tiny grape tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers were beautiful small cantaloupe and watermelon, herbs (including a large stalk of mint), and a flower garden designed for bees and hummingbirds.

After I left the park, I strolled down to the boat landing on the end of Goff Avenue. I'm surprised it was so quiet. I saw a few kids on bikes and one guy walking past with his Walkman, but that was it. I'm assuming a lot of people took advantage of this nice weather to work on their backyards or head out to the Shore before the kids go back to school. The view at the boat landing was breathtaking. I could see right to the Ben Franklin Bridge. The river was filled with what I thought was algae but seemed to be some kind of green grass when I lifted it with a downed branch.

I did a little on the computer when I got back, then had Blackberry Muffins for a quick lunch and headed off to work. Work was much busier than it has been the past couple of days, and alas, more frustrating. One woman paid for 16 dollars of her 18 dollar order in quarters. There's a coin-deposit machine right in the lobby. She could have used that and not held up the express line. A few minutes later, another woman kicked up a fuss because she couldn't buy two 12 packs of Coke and two 12 packs of Canada Dry. You can't mix and match the brands. Only the flavors. The three major soda companies do not like to play nice with each other. People don't like to hear that, of course. I was so happy when one of the college boys who was stocking shelves came in for me.

Things didn't go much better at home. I tried to make a dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate mix, club soda, eggs, yogurt, and vegetable oil. I guess I didn't let it cook long enough. It tasted ok, but it fell apart when I tried to take it out of the pan.