Things are looking up for the cocktail farmers. J managed to liberate the grow lights from UPS’ clutches yesterday on his lunch hour and installed them last night. They look great, and apparently use half the electricity of the ones we filched from our attic.
Last night while J was busy with our new lights, I began the search for the strawberry seeds. I remember putting them on the top shelf of the freezer. I even took a photo, way back on March 1:
So I started there. Now, I think it’s a pretty standard design for most systems that freezer shelves are not solid construction but more like racks with bars, so when I didn’t find them on the top shelf, I moved down a shelf, thinking that perhaps they slipped down and ended up there. Nope! Nothing. Onto shelf three, with the same result. At this point I was mystified – sure, the package isn’t very big, but it’s not like we would have pulled them out of the freezer to use in a recipe for anything. Shelf four, also a bust, led me to pull out and empty the drawer where I keep frozen meats. Then I removed the drawer and looked underneath it. No strawberry seeds. What the hell….? I was pondering where they might have disappeared to when inspiration struck, and I looked on top of the fridge…………..and there they were! They were obviously removed at some point when we were rummaging in the freezer and forgotten. J swears he never saw the seeds in the freezer, leading me to belive that I am the one who removed them. The question remains – when? And were they in the freezer long enough to make a difference? Risk taker that I am (with a $1.29 package of seeds, mind you) I am just going to plant them and see what happens. Worst case scenario, I will still be purchasing strawberries at the farmers’ markets this summer. Also, we have chipmunks and a groundhog out therre – it’s only a 50/50 chance I’ll get any strawberries anyway.
On the bright side, my freezer has not been so organized since we moved into the house four years ago.
Here’s the cocktail I drank the night we found out the Back Forty garden is on our neighbor’s property. I decided it should be called “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and J did not object.
2 oz Gin
2 oz pineapple juice
1 oz Chambourd
1 oz Grand Marnier
Mix in a shaker with ice until shaker is too cold to hold, pour equally into two glasses, Serves 2. Or one, if you’ve had a very bad day.
