Summer Harvest Time

Began a cloudy day with this week's American Top 40 re-run. Summer 1978 kicked off with soul, pop, ballads, jazz, and tons of disco. Hits that mid-June included "You're the One That I Want" by Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta from that summer's mega-hit movie Grease, "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" by Meatloaf, "Take a Chance On Me" by ABBA, the instrumental jazz tune "Feels So Good" by Chuck Mangione, "Baker Street" by Gerry Rafferty, "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late" by Johnny Mathis and Denise Williams, "The Groove Line" by Heatwave, "Still the Same" by Bob Seeger and the Silver Bullet Band, "Because the Night" by Patti Smith, and "Bluer Than Blue" by Michael Johnson.

That month's number one song would go on to be 1978's biggest hit. Teen heartthrob Andy Gibb had three songs hit the top of the charts in a row in 1977 and 1978, ending with the seven-week run of "Shadow Dancing."

There was only one yard sale listed for today, and I didn't really feel up to it after all the running around I did this week and last week. I settled for a quick trip to the Collingswood Farm Market instead. The Farm Market was bustling despite the clouds, and no wonder. The first round of the summer harvest had made its debut. I saw the first corn, tomatoes, raspberries, blackberries, green beans, cucumbers, and New Jersey blueberries of the season today. I finally ended up with blueberries, more cherries, a tomato, a cucumber, and organic romaine lettuce and snap peas.

It began sprinkling as I headed towards Oaklyn's tiny post office. I needed stamps. As I got off my bike to walk into the building, one of the straps on my backpack came off. Darn it! I knew those darn vinyl straps weren't going to last. I did get the stamps I needed, but I ended up dumping the backpack into my bike basket. Good thing I put most of the fruit and vegetables into the bag I brought.

When I got home, I tried to look up backpacks online, but I got distracted looking up other things. I did finally get off in time for a quick lunch and to watch a few Popeye cartoons. "I Wanna Be a Lifeguard" is one of the many Popeye/Bluto battles, here to see who can dominate the pool and be a lifeguard for Olive. Popeye also goes up against Bluto in "Bridge Ahoy." Popeye, Olive, and Wimpy want to build a bridge to avoid the high fees on Bluto's ferry. Needless to say, Bluto doesn't like this one bit.

Though the clouds were clearing by the time I went to work at 1, work was still quite busy throughout the afternoon. Good thing we had plenty of help. It finally died around 6, allowing me to get out without a relief.

And much to my surprise, I actually have a pretty decent schedule this week, not something I was expecting between holidays. Mostly early hours, including a 9AM shift on Wednesday, and Thursday and Friday off. Hopefully, this will allow me to get some cleaning done and figure out what to do with the rest of my summer.

When I got home, I made a Chicken Garden Salad with farm market romaine lettuce, cucumbers, and radishes, along with sliced breaded chicken from the other night, and started the public domain DVD set Lauren gave me. Unlike the set that Jessa gave me two Christmases ago, this one indicates which cartoons are on where. I started off with more Popeye, mainly the color shorts from the 50s. "Spooky Swabs" lands Olive and Popeye on an abandoned ship filled with ghosts who don't want them there! Popeye spends "Patriotic Popeye" trying to keep his nephews from spending the 4th of July setting off damaging fireworks. Things are "Taxi-Turvy" when Popeye and Bluto compete to take Olive to her destination. And Popeye is Popeye-rella in "Ancient Fistory" when, thanks to his Fairy Godfather (Pappy), he's able to dress up for the ball to woo Princess Olive and rescue her from overzealous Bluto.