Summer 2009, Recipes, Water Melon, Cape Cod, Philly

Gosh, it's been so long since I posted. Summer gets to be too hectic, although this year summer has been a joke so far. Even the flowers did not bloom as they should have. A very half-hearted attempt just like the season itself. The last few days have been the dog days of August (this never fails) which was preceded by rains of biblical proportions. Even the grass had said, "Enough already!"

August is when half of New York seems to be a in lock-down mode. Very few business transactions seem to take place except for hiked up (than usual) real estate deals. A New Yorker is too aware of the soon-to-arrive winter (yes, before one knows it, it's November in New York), so like a destitute at a banquet, in August, New Yorkers set aside everything else and lap up the fading summer glory in its every facet.

I too took in my share. For the July 4 weekend we made our first trip to Cape Cod with a day trip to Martha's Vineyard. The picture perfect day was nothing less than heaven. We spent time mainly at Oaks Bluff and Edgartown (recommended by a fellow lodger at the B&B we stayed in in Hyannis). Like we had done before, too, on our way back we took the ferry from New London, CT to Orient Point, Long Island, NY.

On long trips I too tend to read (especially on road trips, while my hubby drives I catch up on the New York Times Sunday Magazines reading out some of the more interesting pieces to hubby also) but on my boat trip I realized more was happening around me than what I could have ever found in books, which anyway I could catch up on later. Nothing can beat the real-life stories in real time. One of the funniest things was a little boy---no more than a year-and-a-half old---the way he was cussing at his mother: f*** you, his setting totally oblivious to him.

It was another picture-perfect day and of course, the drive back home from Orient Point is something I love. Particularly the stopover in quaint Greenport. A cup of Hershey's ice cream (lotsa of my favorite caramel in it) capped my weekend binging.

On July 26, we drove to Philly, yet another beautiful place that I am very fond of and just two hours from home. It was another gorgeous day when life looked and felt like it could be perfect. It was a nice outing for dad who doesn't go out much these days. Yet another ferry ride between historic Philly and Camden (an aquarium is an attraction here; we had gone to the fabulous Mystic, CT aquarium on our way back from Hyannis to New London), NJ on the Delaware river made the trip a richer exp. Before summer is officially over, perhaps one more trip somewhere close by may be nice. Will have to see.

Met a couple of interesting people in July, one, a father Charles (http://www.gnana.info/) from India who was visiting St. Joseph's Parish in Kings Park for a year. He went back today.

Accidentally learned watermelon smoothie from a recipe in the New York Times. The timing was perfect. Here was this huge melon cut up into five large pieces like a dismembered body and tucked away in the crisper and slowly disintegrating. The recipe came in real handy. Here it is: melon slices plus sugar to taste plus lime/lemon (I used lemon) juice. I felt adding fresh ginger would make the drink more delicious. I was right. I tried both with and without the ginger. With is amazing! Throw them all in together into an electric blender and puree them. I grated them first mainly because of the ginger pieces.

Got to go now.

Ciao!
Ro.