http://www.bearmountainbooks.com An Ever Growing Bookshelf Thu, 24 Jul 2008 07:46:56 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Well, that's it folks. The zucchini hosted the last worm it could stand. Looked pretty bad the last few days. I tried to save it again--found three or more worms in the stalk about 3 or 4 days ago. I dug them out with a sharp stick, shot the ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/home/project-zucchini/ 7/17/08 Couple of writing items, both great news! Wrong World has decided to perform Haunting Clues in a special Halloween issue! I'm pretty impressed with their work; it's a classy site with top-notch presentation. The short stories are sold as a packaged DVD or on a per download ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/home/news-flash/ I hesitate to talk about this because stray cats can be so heartbreaking. We adopted one in the past and had a great two years with her before she disappeared without a trace. We had to capture her and her three kittens, take them all in and get ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/books-and-stories/project-cat/project-cat/ Planning a possible trip to Spain next year. Thinking about going in Sept or Oct. Yeah, yeah, I've noticed the weak dollar. My plan is to cost average in. Buy some now (well, when the dollar pretends to be strong again) and then buy a little ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/travel/europe/spain/spain/ I love gardening, I truly do. But there are days when I hate it. There are times when it seems that every bug in the county is in my garden and they brought their pet worms to play with. This morning, the garden was drippy. It's ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/home/bad-gardening-day/ Around the Bend is now available over at www.AnthologyBuilder.com!!! I've created two different anthologies with this story in it--you can order the exact anthologies from their library or you can pick and choose your own stories. Check out the artwork on these two!! I just love them both. The Dragon Wings ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/books-and-stories/short-stories/around-the-bend-in-print/ Actually it's the first cantaloupe I've ever grown, period. And it was a success, if I do say so myself! It's a "little sweetie" that is smaller than your average cantaloupe--supposedly about the size of a softball. This one is considerably bigger than that and I'm not ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/home/first-cantaloupe-of-2008/ Let's talk about Chocolate. I know you want to. Sure, it would be even better to EAT the stuff, but that's essentially what we'll be talking about anyway! Have you noticed that grocery stores (including Wal-Mart) are starting to carry better chocolates? Instead of just low-end Hersey's there's the high-end Hersey ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/recipes/desserts/chocolate/ Today I made red chile sauce.  This is a very time-intensive work of art.  The recipe isn't difficult, but it requires straining the soaked red chile through a vegetable mill (sometimes called a rice mill.)   This milling is done twice (sort of like first pressed olive oil and second press. )  ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/recipes/main-dishes/mexican-dishes/red-chile-lost-art/ Zucchini in Texas is a lot of work. We have these nasty little moths that look a lot like orange wasps. They lay their eggs (see above picture) on zucchini stalks. The little worm that hatches bites into the stems and begins to eat the plant from the ... http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/gardening/cucumbers/nasty-cutworms-squash-vine-borer/