Abnormal Groceries and Brand-Name Shame

You know how when people look in your cupboards or fridge without being asked to, you feel sort of -- naked? Or offended? As if they should beg your pardon? And how other people's cupboards and fridges seem utterly foreign?

You know how, if you have a choice, you hide generic and store brand supplies, instead putting brand-name cans and bottles out for guests? Which is why for hair products I began buying only Pantene because it was the only brand that if someone saw them in the bathroom it wouldn't embarrass me ("Aussie"? "BedHead"? "Nizoral"? "Pert"?).

You know how when you first start dating, you two go to all the best places, drink fine wine, gift the rarest chocolates, and then you settle in or marry and live like paupers scraping ash off burnt toast in dread of spending one extra penny?

Well, I'm giving all that up because now I grocery-shop online, and with the coronavirus hoarding shortages and shortfalls of this and that, one must accept substitutions for familiar name brands, allowing into my house, for the first time, strange new name brands and packaging at unfamiliar price points.

After unpacking my last grocery shipment I left the non-perishables out on top of the microwave not wanting put them away and could not figure out why, but now I think:

1) These brands are like strangers in the house and I have this weird need to get used to them.
2) This is my "store." Actually going to the store could be lethal, what with all these people scorning masks and wanting their freedom, so I've re-created a version of a "store" and enjoy the feeling of variety and wealth that was part of American grocery shopping. 

Tomato Growing: Six Tips for Success

1. Gardener or guest, don't ever caress, pluck, fondle, feel up, or otherwise play with a tomato plant's foliage so you can inhale its gorgeous tomato scent. That's how animals locate tomato plants: by scent. Hands off.
2. When staking, wash and dry the stakes first and then use twine, organic preferred. Don't tie it tightly and avoid twist-ties, rope, thread, cloth, clamps or rubber bands which can scar the stem or hold water and cause rot.

3. Spraying or dousing the plant with water encourages fungus and leaf yellowing. Water at the soil level, splashing as little as possible.

Big Boys, July 4th

4. Use freshly-cleaned scissors to clip away "suckers" (upstart leafy growths in the "Vs" of the tomato branches) and THEN use the scissors to clip yellowed leaves from around the bottom of the plant. Clip away only the leaves that are majority-yellow. Do this in the morning so that the scars (and resulting tomato scent) can heal by nightfall, when the raccoons and skunks prowl. Gather the cut foliage and dispose of it far away from the garden.

5. Every other day, water until the bed has standing water.

6. To rid the leaves of "tiny white winged bugs" (thrips), Method 1: Boil a pinch of tobacco in two cups of water  (it stinks) and when cooled, pour this in a circle around the affected plant. Boiling this mixture hard kills any tobacco mosaic virus the tobacco might be harboring. Method 2:  Blast the bugs off the leaves with a brief spray of water. Spray sidewise, not downward toward the soil. Once should do it. This is the only time you break Rule 3.

The tomato is ripe if it's evenly colored and releases easily from the plant. Resist the urge to leave it hanging hoping it'll be growin' a little redder or bigger; that's just asking a critter to come and get it.

Missouri Loves Frozen Custard

This was the line at Spooner's frozen-custard stand on a Monday night in May. In Wisconsin we ate ice cream, but Missourians go for frozen custard. The differences: Ice cream is based on dairy products and has air whipped into it; frozen custard includes egg products as well as dairy, and is not whipped. In Missouri they also make "concretes," which is taking your sundae and all your mix-ins and blending them so you get a cup of smooth frozen stuff and can't tell what's in it unless you taste it. I want to see my custard, my hot-fudge sauce, marshmallow fluff, graham bits, whipped cream, nuts, and cherries, and sculpt 'em and blend 'em like a painter with my plastic spoon. Maybe when it's hotter, I'll have the banana split.