summer heat

Before I get down to business, I have a bit of good news: Christopher is a winner of the Break-Up essay contest on The Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC. The contest was judged by Leonard's brother, Phillip Lopate, and both of them will be discussing the essays tomorrow afternoon on the show. Christopher will be on hand to read part of his essay and talk a little about himself. Exciting, no? Tune in from 1:20-2:00pm. If you aren't in New York City, you can listen online here. (I believe you can also listen to past episodes, so if you miss the live broadcast you can still check it out.)

The weather has been disgusting. It is humid. It is hot. It is unbearable.

With much pain and frustration, we installed an air conditioner in the living room about a week ago. It cools most of the living space fairly well. Since the evenings have been cooler, our bedroom hasn't really needed an air conditioner (though Christopher doesn't like the street noise from the open window). In any case, the bedroom AC has been low priority even though we have one hanging around. Which is too bad, because last night was really, super humid and hot. Our bedroom felt like a steam room. Christopher retired to the Aero bed in the living room and at around 3am I crashed on the sofa. We were miserable.

New York in the summer. It can be great, but when it's like this it can also be a nightmare. Today there was a power outage in the Bronx, which led to signal problems on the subways, which led to crowds of sweaty grumpy people on the stagnant platforms. The smells are amplfied, but mostly in bad ways: armpits, garbage, urine. Air conditioners drip from above onto one's head; I looked in the mirror today several hours after being dripped on and discovered that my face was covered in large black spots.

There is an upside, however: the farmer's markets are bursting with produce. I emerged from the subway at Union Square this afternoon and found myself in the farmer's market. It's odd, because I am often in Union Square, but I forget to go to the farmer's market. In any case, I bought myself a pound of potting soil, some baby carrots that look like parsnips, some little zucchinis and green garlic with the scapes still attached. I'm very excited to see what I can cook with these exotic, local items! Anyone have suggestions?