As Good As It Gets

I have been pretty disappointed with our tomatoes this year. With the drought, we've had to toss away the first two dozen or so fruit that have come of our vines -- they've been ravaged with blossom end rot. I've picked a few green tomatoes when they looked like they held promise -- Husband used them for fried green tomatoes. (His secret is some sugar in the egg wash; it caramelizes!)

I've been proud of some lettuce I've been growing. I bought a packet that had five kinds of lettuce seed and sowed it in planters, spacing the plantings about three weeks apart. We've gone through the first planter and are starting on the second. It's nothing like Iceberg, take my word for it.

Well, this morning I went out to the garden to check for more blossom end rot, and I found just one tomato that had to be thrown into the hayfield. Then I looked down at a vine and saw RED! I approached it, expecting it to be more damaged fruit, but what my hand grasped was a solid, red globe that filled my palm with absolutely no flaw.

So I took it to show Husband, hiding it from him at first, making him guess which hand. Darn if he didn't get it right the first time. "Finally!"

"Does this say 'sandwich' to you?" I asked.

"It sure does."

Just before lunchtime, he came begging me to pick some of my lettuce. He said "Please." How could I resist? How could I resist the sandwich, homegrown tomato, tender lettuce, real mayonnaise from a jar, wheat bread.

"This is as good as it gets!" Husband said. I agreed. (The only reservation I have might be Asti Spumanti and chocolate -- but that's not lunch!)