Ah… Indian Summer. I’m not sure of the origin of that term, but that’s what we’re having here on the west coast where I live, and I must say, I’m quite enjoying it.

My tomatoes, which I planted from seeds, probably too late in the early season, haven’t done well, but with these warm days, they’re ripening. I must say I’m enjoying them, even if I am not really using them in salads like I planned, but instead I’m walking up to the plants and nibbling nice ripe and juicy cherry tomatoes, fresh from the fine.

My cucumbers didnt’ grow.

I planted lettuce, but my son thought it was weeds growing amongst my tomatoes, and pulled them all out.

I have some herbs that have grown nicely, and they will be guests of honor in my spaghetti sauces over the winter.

I had 10 new strawberry plants, and they grew 3 strawberries. I planted 3 blueberry bushes. I didn’t get any blueberries, but I knew that, the guy from the nursery warned me. But I’ll have some next year. I can hardly wait.

A few years ago I planted 3 pumpkin plants, not realizing they would take over the yard. I’ll never do that again.

I’m not sure what I’ll plant next year, I don’t have a garden, but plant some things along side the fence. Who knows. Maybe cantelope?

I think I’d forgotten what life was like in that first week when the family gets a new puppy. How do you spell hectic? I think it’s P-U-P-P-Y.

Between the two of us, my husband I have been following our new puppy around the house pretty much 24-7, and we’d both fogotten how exhausting this can be. We now appreciate the consitency and predictability of our 7 year old dog more than ever.

He’s an adorable little guy, though, and when he’s housetrained, he’s going to be a great little dog. He’s half Miniature Schnauzer and half Scottie. If we follow the same pattern as in Maltese + Poodle = Maltipoo, and Schnauzer + Poodle = Schnoodle then Schnauzer + Scottie = Schnottie.

That maybe isn’t so dignified, but in a way, that quite describes him.

I’ll have a picture posted of him soon.

There are few things more excting to a family than getting a new puppy. This is a very exciting time for us becasue we just got a new puppy! He is half Miniature Schnauzer and half Scottish Terrier, and he is the most adorable little guy.

We bought him online, and he was flown in from northern BC. Picking him up at the airport was quite an experience. We went to the South Terminal of the Vancouver International Airport, where the small planes fly in from the small and remote locations. The terminal is very small, but homey and almost fun, well, for an airport. The young men who took him off the plane and brought him to us were very nice, and they even made a special trip to pre-unload him from the plane first.

The plane was so small there was no real “baggage compartment”, instead the baggage was just loaded at the back of the plane, to the rear of the passenger section, so it would have been a much less stressful trip for an animal, and as far as I’m concerned, much less subject to risk as well.

So now I’m the proud parent of a new puppy. One day that little airport experience is going to make it into a book, I think.

Where has the time gone? Where has the summer gone? I don’t know about anyone else, but here on the west coast in what most people call the “Pacific Northwest” we’ve had one of the rottenest summers in memory. I am a writer, therefore, for the sake of argument, I am allowed to use words that don’t exist in order to convey the most accurate meaning, and if “rottenest” isn’t a real word, then by definition, it should be.

But alas, here it is the Labour/Labor Day Weekend (spelled both ways out of courtesy for both Canadian and American readers) which means this is the last weekend the outdoor pool will be open (boo), and tomorrow the kids go back to school (yay), the days are getting shorter (boo) and we’ll soon no longer need to spend loads of money to keep the air conditioning running (yay) (or is that a boo?)

It’s time to get back into the routine, and I’m not going to say yay or boo to that, because most of the time, the routine of life is good. It’s a routine because it works and it’s comfortable. Unless it’s Deadline Time on the next book.

Till next time.