Whew. Summer is packing a punch this year. Even though I’ve been enjoying this weather from a pool perspective, it’s getting a bit old. Lots of sun and no rain. It’s starting to feel like Colorado around here, and that is not necessarily a good thing since no one here can water their lawns because most of us are on wells in the country. Even people in larger towns do not have the in-ground sprinkler systems that are absolutely necessary there. Our lawn is crisping up and there isn’t much we can do about it. We water our new landscaping in the front only as needed. Where is the rain? I am tired of seeing the relentless sun every day!

The season is starting its decline though. The sun’s angle is lower week by week. Areas of the pool that used to stay in the sun until late afternoon are now shaded. Soon that will lead to a cooler pool temperature than the steady 82 degrees that it’s been maintaining for a over a month now.

At least one person is benefitting from all these brown, crispy lawns. A man who owns a company spraying lawns green with dye is making lots of money. Can you imagine? What does that say about us culturally? We’re so into our green perfect lawns that we would dye them green and potentially harm the environment? He states that his dye is safe for children and pets but I have to wonder. Unless he’s using food coloring! Will the grass need its roots touched up as well?

The other morning I was in the computer room when I heard Bella bark. I thought she wanted to go out, but when I got to the sun room she was looking up at the screen door. Clinging to the inside of the screen was a large green bug. mom, there’s an intruder in the house and i don’t know what it is! Me either, Bella. Never seen one like this before. When I tried to capture it to take it outside it emitted a noise not unlike a cicada, only it wasn’t a cicada. This got everyone’s attention, cats and dog alike. what is that thing?  I took this video so I could try and identify it later on.

Katydid from Rick & Lynne Robinson on Vimeo.

Bella was very intrigued by it. I think it was injured to begin with because it could not fly away.

The next morning there was another one clinging to the outside basement wall of the house. I took photos and headed off to Google it. I typed in “green bug that looks like a grasshopper but is not” and came up with a solution. Meet Mr./Mrs. Katydid.

We’ve long thought the the cicadas were getting back up from something else like crickets, and here is the proof. But why haven’t we ever seen one before?

The turkeys come around every day and I usually give in and feed them some sunflower seeds and cracked corn. I have one that comes all by itself early in the morning and it just stands there looking at the house, willing the front door to open and for me to come and throw a few handfuls of food out. The other day around midday the big turkey family came (three hens and assorted aged babies) and I went out to feed them. The dumb clucks left instead of hanging around to eat the food and I figured the squirrels, birds and chipmunks would make short order of it. When I looked out an hour later this is what I saw instead.

oops. I’ve done this countless times before without bear visits. Trust me, this was not intentional! Not the same little cub as in the previous post; this one is probably a yearling.

what do you mean this isn’t my food bowl?

who is that crazy lady hanging out the window up there talking to me?

i think i heard something

Right after I took this photo the cub ran off into the shelter of the woods and halfway up a tree. I don’t know what it heard that spooked it, but it was afraid of something. A few minutes later it decided it was safe and back it came.

I’ve been keeping my eye on these grapes growing by the side of our street. Concord grapes. They are tasty and sweet but have a lot of pits! If we don’t get some rain they will just turn into raisins on the vine! I hope not as I plan to snatch them the minute they get ripe.

We had a full weekend with a picnic to Bear Mountain, dog walks, farmer’s market and pool time. On Saturday night we did something we’ve talked about doing for a long time. We “camped out” in the cabana for a while. After our nighttime swim we brought out the air mattress and pillows and just lay there listening to the cicadas (and katydids!). We both fell asleep and sometime later I felt Rick shaking me awake. Time to go back inside before the dogs miss us.

(taken this way on purpose! I happen to like warped nighttime photos.)

Sorry for the rambling post about a mishmash of things. I just sat down and started typing and this is what came out!

I have more to share this week with photos of our drive to Harriman State Park and Bear Mountain on Saturday and the surprise we got on Sunday morning while washing Mia, so stay tuned!

Ever since fellow blogger, Lettuce Eating, visited New York City (she lives in London) and told me how she went on this food tour, I’ve been longing to do it. What better excuse to finally just “do it” than hosting a visitor over the weekend last week? Anne-Lise (the daughter of our dear friends in France) took a few days out from her busy college schedule in Quebec to come and stay with us. Since we had not seen her since she was 8 years old it was nice to “meet” the wonderful grown woman she has become at age 22! Where did the years go?

We drove in to the city and left early in case the traffic was all snarled up, which if course it wasn’t and we arrived at the closest parking garage to our meeting point in the Village in just over one hour. Amazing! It still seems unreal to me that we live that close to NYC and that Rick is brave enough to drive in Manhattan!

We met in front of Murray’s Cheese.

Here is the only photo I took while inside. It was really crowded, so kind of hard to get photos of all the luscious cheeses and other cool things they had to offer. You can buy these “gift” boxes!

Our first tasting stop was Joe’s Pizza. Did you happen to notice that pizza pie at the beginning of the post? Hmm ... how could you not? I hope it made you hungry because it was certainly delicious! I thought we would each get just a bite of pizza, but we had one whole slice to ourselves. Our guide, Barri, gave us the background history on Joe’s and how they make their sauce. No big list of topping ingredients here. Just your basic tomato sauce and cheese on top of a wonderfully thin crust. Photos of a younger Joe posing with famous people covered the walls. As we left the store we actually got to see “Joe” standing outside talking to someone. Hey, a “celebrity” sighting!

Next we sampled rice balls (or arancini) from Faicco’s Italian Specialty Food Shop (Previously Faicco’s Pork Store) which is right next door to Murray’s Cheese. That’s our guide passing them out. We ate on the street because the shop is just too small to fit us all in at the same time.

Even though they took the pork out of the name, the pig remains on the sign. *oink, oink*

Just look at this line up of wonderful food shops: Amy’s Bread, The Lobster Place (we just peeked in here—so much wonderful looking fresh fish!), Murray’s Cheese Shop and Faicco’s all in a row! Bread, fish, cheese and pork. The only thing missing is a butcher shop for beef.

Our guide told us a lot about the the area and different buildings. I even learned something new about how to tell how old a brick house was by they way the bricks are laid. She pointed out places along the way where a film or television series had been shot. We saw the outside of the house where contestants from the Next Network Food Star were housed a few years ago, the church garden where most of the garden scenes from the movie Doubt were filmed, and the outside of the building that was supposed to be where they lived on Friends. I never watched the show so I didn’t have a clue.

It’s quiet and lovely and at times hard to believe you are still in the city. And, from what we understand, extremely pricey to live here now. No more starving poets and artists. You pretty much have to have “made it” to live in the Village today.

After the rice balls we headed to Home (American Gourmet Comfort food). In this tiny little restaurant we got to sit down and eat in their little courtyard garden in back. By this time it had started to drizzle so the chef rolled out the awnings for us.

Our tasting here was none other than comfort food at its best: Mac & Cheese. This was not your average Mac & Cheese though ... yum. Go ahead, take a bite. You know you want to.

We visited the Cornelia Street Café which has club space downstairs in the basement for aspiring poets, musicians, and storytellers. It’s like a cave down there and very reminiscent of the old beatnik days. The stage is tiny. Our guide told us that Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick had their first date here. You can tell how narrow it is by looking at us all standing around. When we resurfaced, it was pouring rain! oh dear. Some people came prepared but others did not.

Our guide herded us back over to Faicco’s to the shelter of their large awnings as the rain continued to pour from the sky. While she went in search of some rain ponchos for those that were not prepared for the rain, we all got a chance to go inside the “pork store.” Those are huge “logs” of provolone cheese hanging from the ceiling!

Our next stop was another sit-down tasting which got us out of the rain. By this time I was so full I could barely put another bite of anything into my mouth. They say that the tasting tour is “enough for people to eat so lunch is not usually necessary afterwards.” Hah! That’s a slight understatement. Soy and Sake (Asian inspired Vegetarian Restaurant) was something completely different. We were presented with a beautiful little Bento box full of goodies: BBQ pork (really tofu but tasted a lot like the real thing), fried rice, a dumpling and some delicious fried seaweed.

The other nice thing was the chance to order a glass of wine or sake if we wanted to. (Cost not included in the tour price.) Rick was intrigued by something on the menu called Sake2me described as a “sparkling drink infused with all-natural Asian flavors.” He chose the pear flavor. Stupid me, since I don’t really care for sake I didn’t order one but had white wine instead. His Sake2me was absolutely delicious: light and so refreshing! My wine paled in comparison. I’ve since tried to find it around here but right now it looks like no one is carrying it. I highly recommend trying to find it! Where are Rowan & Martin when you need them?

Back out on the sidewalk again it had (thankfully) mostly stopped raining. Well, at least it wasn’t pouring. The dessert course was up next at Milk & Cookies where we ate huge still-warm-from-the-oven oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. I ate half of mine and saved the rest for later.

But wait! We aren’t done yet! We still have the cheese and olive platter over at Murray’s Cheese Shop and last but not least, cannolis at Rocco’s Pastry Shop which have been voted the best cannolis in NY! Rocco’s is only a few doors down from Murray’s, Amy’s etc., and across the street. Good thing I don’t live in this neighborhood.

Whew! Are you full yet? Did you have enough to eat our would you like some lunch now?

Which one was my favorite you might ask? Well…a close tie between the pizza and mac & cheese. Least fav were the rice balls I think. They were good, but heavy.

Now that we’ve been on this tour there are so many restaurants we passed by and heard about that I want to go back to. Like Fish where for $8.00 you can get a half dozen oysters on the half shell with a glass of beer or wine. Uhm ... do I need to point this out — bargain!! And, I am certain that is exactly what they hope the people on the tour will do: come back and patronize their establishments. Works for me!

I’ll leave you with a somewhat hazy view of Manhattan taken from the Jersey side of the Hudson from Weehawken just as we got out of the Lincoln Tunnel. (Jersey really does have the best view of Manhattan—forget the Empire State Building!)

There are a few other food tours that we’d now like to take after having been on this one. The one to Chelsea Market and the one in Chinatown sound the best. It was so interesting to taste the food and get a lesson on history and architecture all at the same time. I highly recommend the experience next time you happen to visit the Big Apple!

Here is the link to the tour we went on. Other tours are listed on the page as well.

P.S. Be sure to click on all the provided links to visit each restaurant’s/shop’s web site. If there is no link there isn’t a web site!
P.P.S. If you have no clue what I am talking about in my reference to Rowan & Martin you are probably too young to be reading this blog.

No, I am not talking about the TV show which I have never watched. (Hey, I don’t watch all those Jersey shows!)

I am talking about our pool. Our recent weather. Our true summer. Simply Jerseylicious.

Tonight Rick and I sat around after dinner thinking about swimming. Neither one of us really felt like it. No energy. I said to Rick I think we should at least go out and test the pool temperature and go from there.

Hello!

The water temperature was absolutely perfection as well as the cicada background symphony.

We swam lap upon lap. Just one more we promised each other, yet neither one of us could stop.

There is something to be said about swimming at night. Sans suits. Cicadas singing. The rest of the world recedes.

We swim until we simply can’t anymore, promising each other to get up and swim again before we’ve even had our morning coffee.

The days of summer are all too short and soon the pool will be a distant memory.

Seize the day. (or night)

 

No doubt about it. Summer has arrived in New Jersey. It’s HOT. Our pool is really getting a workout. This year the water is crystal clear and the temperature is staying above 80F. Sheer heaven! I am starting to turn a lovely nut brown with all this sun.

Our air conditioning is also getting a workout which isn’t so good for the electric bill. For the past two nights now we’ve opened the windows and slept pretty well with a fan in the window.

Having a second-story bedroom is not ideal in the summer! Add to that the fact that our main attic fan quit a couple of months ago, which makes it all that much hotter upstairs since all that hot air is just trapped in the attic. I waited for the roofer to call all last week for the installation of two new ones (the other one over the garage space makes a huge racket and need replacing too) but due to rain he didn’t make it. He was scheduled to come on Saturday, but of course he was running behind and it just got too darn hot. So he rescheduled for this morning, and of course, we had a thunderstorm! Hopefully he’ll still make it today. [Nope. He just called and will try again tomorrow.]

Which brings me to the thunderstorm topic. This morning’s storm gave a few rumbles of thunder before it arrived and only a few more once it got here. I think I saw one little flash of lightning. That was it. We haven’t had a “real” thunderstorm yet this year. Usually we get house-rattling storms with lots of lightning and thunder. Other areas have gotten them, but here at the house they just don’t seem to materialize. I know it’s crazy, but I miss them. Somehow a good thunderstorm just discharges all that energy and washes the atmosphere clean again. This morning’s storm held promise but in the end it did not deliver. At least it rained.

Another reason we know that summer is really here, the cicadas have taken up their summer buzzy songs in the trees. They sing a different song during the day than they do at night. They love it when it gets hot and humid. During the day their song is just a steady buzzy trill—one note. At night it’s kind of like this —CHE CHE CHE ... che che che—one set of “che’s” being lower than the other, almost like they are talking to each other. The frogs are still in the background too at night, so it’s like a nature symphony. Very soothing.

We had a lovely drive to the market in Warwick on Sunday in Mia. The morning was beautiful and we took all the winding little back roads. We ate breakfast outside at the little French restaurant, sharing a baked egg, potato and ham casserole and sipping a huge bowl of café au lait.

On passing one of the shops as we made our way over the market, I couldn’t pass up this straw market bag. I am thinking it will also make a great beach bag for toting towels, books and whatever else we want on the beach with us when we go down the shore next month for a weekend. I love it!

The market was very busy and we were surprised and delighted to see fresh Jersey sweet corn (white! yum!) and the first of the tomatoes. Peaches are also now in season and so juicy and delicious! It’s best to eat them over a bowl or something to catch all the juice that dribbles down your chin.

I also could not resist this gorgeous sunflower for $2.00.

We took the “long way home” from the market. As we drove up our street a doe and her two tiny fawns were in the road right in front of our house. So beautiful! They dashed into the woods all too quickly.

When we got home we grilled spicy hot chicken wings (our go-to Sunday lunch) and then into the pool.

We decided to eat outside by the pool last night even though it was still pretty hot. I moved the furniture out of the cabana and set up the card table.

Last night we tried a new recipe, a sort of deconstructed BLT sandwich in salad form. It was the perfect meal for a hot day. Romaine lettuce, chopped bacon, chunks of fresh watermelon, orange cherry tomatoes from the market (super sweet!), fresh baguette croutons (done in a little of the bacon fat) and topped with a homemade Parmesan peppercorn dressing. Very very tasty. We’ll be having this again.

It’s kind of nice to have summer (compared to last year’s summer-that-wasn’t) but if this heat keeps up we’ll be glad when it’s over! Like this blossom that fell into the pool, we’re just trying to stay afloat through this second heat wave.

Stay cool!

P.S. Have you checked out the “On this day ...” feature on the right hand side of the blog? It’s right under “My Favorite Links” and features blog entries from previous years that I wrote on or around this same date. Check it out!

I just came in from having an early morning swim. I wasn’t planning on swimming, just rolling the cover back and adding some chlorine. But ...
the water looked so inviting ...
the sun was shining ...
the pool spoke softly “come on in, Lynne.”
So I did.
Sans suit.

I’ll be hanging out here later on in the day I’m sure.