I traveled out to the Eastern Shore for 2 days to catch up with friends and colleagues. Driving down the rural roads late at night Delmarva's wildlife was out in full force - deer, fox, raccoon and rabbits lined the roads to Carol's house. Carol had waited up for me wanting to see the reunion between Tarka (the cat) and myself. Tarka did seem to recognize me, and since Carol shut her out of her room that night Tarka spent the night at the foot of my bed. Morning light brought a bucolic view out the upstairs windows over a field full of asters, sumacs and saltbush.
Some other highlights from the trip included Pat B.'s microbe cake (see photo!). We discussed "Teaming with Microbes" for book club Wednesday night and she had a made a delicious 3 layer cake filled with rasberry and chocolate mousse. The outside was elaborately decorated with all kinds of soil web creatures like worms, ants and ladybugs. Beverly brought a great pumpkin cake with cream cheese (I finished that cake off for breakfast over a couple days!). The next day was the new volunteer training class's graduation lunch. All kinds of great people and food appeared for that lunch. And of course with Halloween approaching Paul and Buck's Haunted Hayride decorations in the woods and meadows were taking on a life of their own. Thursday night I caught up with Laura and Michelle and Brian over a dinner at Hillside in Centreville.
Just another quick story about food. I had mailed a box to Carol with some things and decided to include the ingredients for making the traditional New Mexican dish, posole, to take to the graduation lunch. I decided rather than try to get to the grocery first thing in the morning, I would just send everything including a box of vegetable broth. Well, I guess the changes in air pressure weren't so good for the vegetable broth because when the box arrived at Carol's it was soaked and the bottom was falling out! So much for efficiency. Fortunately nothing else in the box was damaged although I guess Tarka's new catnip toy will forever have a slight taste of broth in addition to catnip.
It was wonderful to catch up with so many of the friends and Arboretum staff in just 2 days. I look forward to spending more time with everyone again after May!
Some other highlights from the trip included Pat B.'s microbe cake (see photo!). We discussed "Teaming with Microbes" for book club Wednesday night and she had a made a delicious 3 layer cake filled with rasberry and chocolate mousse. The outside was elaborately decorated with all kinds of soil web creatures like worms, ants and ladybugs. Beverly brought a great pumpkin cake with cream cheese (I finished that cake off for breakfast over a couple days!). The next day was the new volunteer training class's graduation lunch. All kinds of great people and food appeared for that lunch. And of course with Halloween approaching Paul and Buck's Haunted Hayride decorations in the woods and meadows were taking on a life of their own. Thursday night I caught up with Laura and Michelle and Brian over a dinner at Hillside in Centreville.
Just another quick story about food. I had mailed a box to Carol with some things and decided to include the ingredients for making the traditional New Mexican dish, posole, to take to the graduation lunch. I decided rather than try to get to the grocery first thing in the morning, I would just send everything including a box of vegetable broth. Well, I guess the changes in air pressure weren't so good for the vegetable broth because when the box arrived at Carol's it was soaked and the bottom was falling out! So much for efficiency. Fortunately nothing else in the box was damaged although I guess Tarka's new catnip toy will forever have a slight taste of broth in addition to catnip.
It was wonderful to catch up with so many of the friends and Arboretum staff in just 2 days. I look forward to spending more time with everyone again after May!
2 comments:
It was sooo good to see you in person! It sounds like a whirlwind - you are probably still recovering!
Oh and I can't forget that cake! What a spectacular job Pat did on it!
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