Meyer lemons

Yesterday's mail brought us an unexpected and most welcome treat: a box FULL of beautiful Meyers lemons and fresh rosemary in bloom. A good friend and excellent cook who winters in Carmel Valley (although we know her heart is in Juneau in October when it is pelting rain and gusting 30) has, alas, an abundance of fresh lemons. Like kittens, they arrived with just a note that said "we need a home".

We squeezed and shaved some over the plain chicken breasts and added a bit of the rosemary, to serve over basmati rice, with broccoli, with a salad and fruit of course, and a melange of wine. I think I chose the Pinot Grigio, and I don't recall what John was drinking. We spoke of this and that, I think it was last night that John revealed that he'd had a dream that I rented Disneyland for his birthday and you all came and everyone had a wonderful time, which reminds me, his birthday is coming up, and in spite of him claiming that he doesn't want anything, I think the stakes are higher than a surprise bowling party this year....Although we haven't done that in a while, and maybe, if he doesn't read this, we could pull it off again. Will you come?

This morning I (first photographed the items as you see) bundled many of them up and took them to the Juneau Arts & Culture Center and arranged them decoratively in a basket with the note attached.

The REACH Canvas program uses our Main Hall while their facility is being renovated. This is a program that uses art to integrate folks with a variety of disabilities into the community, in a way I think it is the perfect and highest use of the arts. They do some dang swell stuff: Yesterday ceramic vases, they've been making masks, and banners and paper mache sculptures. Today, I noticed they took some of the lemons and arranged them in a colander and drew pictures of them that were just delightful.

At the end of the day, as I was locking up, I noticed all the lemons had found a home, just a couple of sprigs of rosemary remained. I put them in a vase and hope they will root, and hope that spring, which seemed very close today with the sun shining brightly, is indeed near at hand. Last year, we were at 6 feet and still digging as I recall.