Harvests, Seed Cucumbers, Long Overdue Cleaning, Grilling, Prince R...

The garden is now on the slide down to fall and the cucumber and squash plants are showing signs of exhaustion and diminished production.

The squash still gave me just over 20 pounds for the day but that is with a skipped day of harvesting to allow them to grow enough. I have 80 pounds to deliver tomorrow and have more than enough in the cooler.

I went through the cucumber rows and picked my two other seed cucumbers, Telegraph on the left and Pepinex on the right.

The plants are definitely about done as they have a smattering of smaller cucs still trying to grow. I got 21 of which only 15 can be sold. I have to deliver 80 of them tomorrow which I have with a few to spare.

The rest of my day was spent under the carport outside my studio cleaning. First I cleaned up the area behind the white bucket in the upper right, raked it and filled a bag with garbage. I got the next course of mat laid down and then had to move the old freezer out of the way. The wheelbarrow got filled twice with gravel that I raked out.

Much of the gravel ended up around the washers pit which I raked and smoothed out. I'm hoping the dog won't be digging in the gravel like he did in the dirt.

I had just barely enough of the mats to make it to the edge. There is a gap under the freezer but it is not really visible. The freezer is moved a bit farther out and we have a nice amount of space available under the carport.

It took me a while but I got this area cleared and cleaned for the first time in possibly a decade. The tables were there and the generator and it was a collection point for many things. My hope is to build some shelves on my studio wall and on the side of the house to give us storage options. With the roofing extended properly now the area should stay pretty dry. I need to cut a piece of pvc to set over the conduit and gas lines as protection.

Small fire in the pit for grilling dinner. The burgers went on then I went to get peppers.

R grabbed some celery stalks while I got a couple Nardello, a Anaheim, and a gold sweet Italian peppers.

The peppers went on with the burgers and stayed on past the buns.

I had turned the new torch on but I had not melted glass with it and so I spent a few minutes playing with the flame melting a clear 8mm rod. On tanks the little thing is a beast and it is SUPER easy to get a oxidizing flame which very easily boils the glass. I was pinching off gobs and dropping them in the water with the tweezers and they shattered. Then I made a teardrop and it cooled a tiny bit as I flame cut the tail and dropped it in the water. The boys wanted to see the glass in the water and when I pulled the can down this Prince Rupert's drop was sitting there.

This thing is strong as steel and can take hammer blows without breaking, but snip the tip of the tail and it will explode. When it is dropped into the water the outer layer cools instantly and hardens while the inside cools more slowly which creates a great amount of stress in the glass that has no way to release it due to the hardened outside. Once the tip is broken it then explodes all the stored stress.

Today I have to get the orders ready for tomorrow morning, harvest what is ready, I should go up and check on the melon garden as there is cool temps back in the forecast, keep cleaning the yard, and drag everything to the dump pile for the run this week.