Gad-zukes!

The zucchini is piling up. I grated and bagged two of the larger ones for the freezer yesterday. Grated squash comes in handy later in the fall for all sorts of things like soups, fritters, and zucchini bread. I'll probably end up putting more in the freezer. We already have blanched zuke disks frozen, but they take up a lot of space and the freezer is filling up.

Zucchini blossoms and fruit in the garden.

It looks like we might have a few warm and sunny days as the week gets going. All kinds of household chores are lined up. I have to make an effort to get them done. It's all about overcoming inertia. Once I get started, the chores go pretty fast. Since we had some rain, the grass will be growing again, which means it will need cutting again. On today's agenda: dealing with recycling and cleaning the bathroom. One (or two) things a day.

The summer garden

The vegetable garden is producing now. I picked three more courgettes (zucchini) yesterday. We're talking about making zucchini fritters this week, among other things. The tomatoes have started ripening, but they're kind of stalled now with this spell of chilly, wet weather. We've got bags of blanched green beans in the freezer and have enjoyed eating fresh beans a few times. Three of the sucrines (a winter squash similar to butternut) have survived. They'll stay in the garden until they go from green to tan later in the fall.

The current state of the garden with tomatoes and zucchini. You can see the fig tree in the background just in front of the red-leafed plum tree.

I went to the market yesterday and found some blettes (chard) for today's meal of white beans and greens. I saw the recipe in the New York Times and it looked worth a try. The chard plants in our garden are too small to harvest right now. They may be ready in another month or so.

Another view

A different angle from yesterday's photo. Those birch trunks are between six and eight feet long. They need to be cut to 33cm lengths to fit into the wood stove. I know, I just mixed my measurement units. I could convert, but I'm too lazy. Anyway, there are a few more trunks like these in what's left of the big pile. So there's work to be done.

The smaller pile on the right is some of the (now dried out) brambles that I cut out of the big pile. There's another pile like it on the other side of the tree. Isn't this fascinating?

Today is market day in Saint-Aignan (as is most every Saturday). I'm going in to get some chard for a recipe that I saw in the NYT food section: Braised white beans with greens. We also need some bread, but not much else.

The gum and bone healing seems to be going well. I'm taking a vitamin D supplement (for strong teeth and bones!) for a few more weeks, but by next weekend I should be off the acetaminophen and done with the gentle-brushing-with-special-toothpaste routine. The stitches should be gone by then, too. The special mouthwash regimen ends tomorrow.

Sticks, no stones

Back when the tops of our birch trees fell and the landscape guy took what was left down, I asked him to save me the bigger branches and trunks so I could cut them into firewood. He left more than I asked for, including the smaller branches with their leaves attached. He piled them all up under our dying Himalayan cedar tree. It was a mess. Since then, I didn't do much about them. I could say I was seasoning the wood, but I just had other things to do. The leaves dried up and faded away and the pile was quickly invaded and totally covered by thorny brambles. Yuck.

What's left of the original pile is in the center. To the left are the larger branches, to the right are the smaller branches and kindling. It doesn't look like much in the photo but, trust me, it is. The metal thing on the far right is the sawhorse.

So now I'm cleaning that up. With a pair of heavy gloves and a garden pruner, I attacked the brambles and removed most of them. I'm dividing the wood into piles of kindling, small logs, and larger logs. The latter will need to be cut up with the chainsaw as we move into fall. So far, I've spent about three or four hours on it. Another three or four hours should do it. Now the question is where will I store it all?

Montrichard

I'm in serious need of some new photos. This one, from 2013, is a view of the bridge over the Cher in the nearby town of Montrichard. The curious thing about Montrichard is that the "t" is pronounced. Normally, the "t" in the French word mont is silent. There are several competing explanations for the pronunciation, but no one is certain which, if any, is correct. You can always spot out-of-towners when they drop the "t."

The town is out of the photo to the right. Montrichard, July 2013.

Things are going well so far on this the second day after my implant procedure. I go in this afternoon to have the temporary crown installed.

Goin' to the chapel

Another shot from inside the chapel at the Château de Chambord. I really liked the colors in this scene.

Looking out the chapel windows. Chambord, July 2013.

My dental procedure yesterday couldn't have gone better. Well, it could have, in that the tooth did not want to come out. At first, the doctor was optimistic. He thought he could pull the tooth in one piece. But it was a stubborn little devil. He ended up having to cut it in two. After that it came out fine.

Then the implant went in and the doctor sewed up part of the gum and it was all over. I felt absolutely no pain, just a little pressure during the extraction. After it was done, I got treated to some luminothérapie. Light therapy. Twelve minutes of exposure to bright light (with eye protection, of course) to facilitate the jaw bone's healing. Ken said it sounded like hocus pocus but, if nothing else, it got me to sit still quietly, at least for twelve minutes. It felt like I was out sitting in the sun. No sign of tanning.

So now I'm on a somewhat steady diet of paracétamol (acetaminophen) for a few days. The only thing I feel is a little soreness. I have some eating restrictions for a couple of days, some special mouthwash, and an ultra soft post-op toothbrush for the first few brushings of the extraction site. The implant is capped for now, but the cap will come off on Thursday when I get a temporary crown installed. Then it's a three month wait for the bone to heal before the permanent crown goes in.

All in all, it was a very positive experience. I suffered more in anticipation than I did in the dentist's chair.

And, on the humorous side, I asked one of the staff about the "no alcohol" restriction. I wanted to know when I could start drinking wine again. Don't worry, she said, wine isn't "alcohol." Then she yelled across the bustling reception area to the doctor in his office, "he can have wine, right?" The doctor laughed and yelled back "of course! Avec plaisir!" You gotta love France.

In case you were wondering

And even if you weren't, here's what the original photo from yesterday's post looks like. The only post-processing I did here was straighten the image and pump up the exposure. It was quite dark; probably an error in metering.

The original digital image taken in jpg format. Chambord, July 2013.

We're supposed to have rain on and off all day. That suits my mood. My dental appointment is this afternoon. I'm having a broken tooth (bicuspid) removed and replaced with an implant. I go back Thursday for the temporary crown. Then, after three months of bone healing, I go back for the permanent crown. I'll be on liquid soft, cold food for a couple of days (Ken's planning a cold leek and potato soup for tomorrow), then I have to avoid chewing on that side of my mouth for about three weeks. I'm sure everything will go fine, but that doesn't stop me from feeling anxious about it.