From the ArcaMax Publishing, Recipes Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/recipes/s-345492-480825
As the afternoon wore on it became hotter and more humid. The air was
so thick and damp you had to swim through it to get anywhere. It was
the kind of day for which air conditioning had been invented. You
basically traveled from your air conditioned house to your air
conditioned car to whatever was your air conditioned destination and
back with minimum time out of at least some type of air conditioning.
Being an expert on tomatoes, I knew the little red gems in my tomato
garden were relishing the weather. I had enjoyed tremendous success
growing tomatoes the first two years I tried. By year three, I was
learning it wasn't as easy to grow tomatoes as I had assumed, after a
run in with some varmints who had taken a liking to my crop.
By year four, I had been forced to build a chicken wire prison around
my garden, complete with chicken wire roof and all to keep the drunk
muskrats from scaling the fence (The muskrats would get high on the
fermented fruit in the orchard and then, with inhibitions lost, jump
or scale the fence to get to the tomatoes.
The garden fortress had been a tremendous success. No drunk muskrats,
or sober ones for that matter, could get in over the fence or through
the roof and the tomatoes were flourishing. In just another week or
so I would harvest a bumper crop of perfect red sandwich tomatoes
(i.e., the kind that are perfect in a tomato sandwich) and be up to my
elbows in fresh salsas and pasta sauce.
The emergency broadcast system was activated late in the afternoon. A
strong line of thunderstorms was heading our way. By the way, why
does the emergency broadcast system still sound the way it did 30
years ago. There must have been tremendous gains in technology for
forecasting storms over the past 30 years but the part you hear on the
radio sound like a throwback to the 1970's. The SOS beeps are
scratchy and obnoxious and the computerized voice usually
mispronounces the names of the local cities and counties.
I suppose it is designed to give everyone the same opportunity to
figure out what is going on. Having localized systems would be OK for
the locals but the Yankees and other tourists around here might not
understand it if the warning was "Gully washer on the way. Y'all
better git."
God Bless America.
Enjoy!