The colcannon was different. Here's recipe colcannon 3-4 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered 3 tbsp. milk or unsweetened/plain soy milk 1/4 tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. pepper 2 cups chopped cabbage or kale 2 tbsp. butter or margarine 1/4 cup chopped onions or green onions Directions: Cook potatoes in a pot of boiling water until tender. Drain, reserving water. Place the hot potatoes in a large bowl. Add chopped cabbage to the reserved potato water. Cook 6-8 minutes or until tender. Meanwhile, fry the onions in the butter or margarine. When they are cool enough to handle, mash potates with a hand masher or fork. Add the fried onions and cabbage. Add milk, salt and pepper and beat until fluffy. Here's the boxty cake: Mine had scallions in them Boxty (Irish Potato Griddle Cakes) 8 Servings (Halve this recipe for smaller families) 1/2 lb raw potato 1/2 lb potato,mashed 1/2 lb all-purpose flour 1 Milk 1 Egg Salt and pepper to taste Grate raw potatoes and mix with the cooked mashed potatoes. Add salt, pepper and flour. Beat egg and add to mixture with just enough milk to make a batter that will drop from a spoon. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto a hot griddle or frying pan. Cook over a moderate heat for 3-4 minutes on each side. Serve with a tart apple sauce: or as part of an Ulster Fry, with fried bacon, fried sausage, fried eggs, fried black pudding, fried bread, fried soda bread. An old poem says: . Boxty on the griddle, boxty in the pan, if you can't make boxty, you'll never get a man.

Costco chickens are brined (soaked in salty water or injected with same before cooking, i don't know which process they use) . That's why the end result is consistently "juicy". The liquid at the bottom of the container is more water than fat but it does seem to mix together and get gelatinous when cooled. The product's convenience and price are tempting but we stopped buying them when they had their episodes in our area of bacterial contamination and periodic undercooking in the stores. That's a bad combination for chicken.

Really much lazier than I anticipated. It rained all morning which I was so glad to see! I always seem to put everything off till the last minute. After I got DH lunch and he went back to work, I set out to replace 3 burntout lightbulbs in the house that had been bugging me. One of them turned out to be unplugged by the darling puppy as she road races behind the couch. That will have to wait until DH gets home, I can't move it by myself. Then off to the bank, and to petsmart to stock back up on food for the cat and dogs. Then off to Tom Thumb store for groceries. Got some really good stuff. I love that store, a bit high end, and a bit spendy if you don't watch it. Got stuff for a huge salad, and our favorite sour dough bread. Tonite will be hot dogs and chicken on the grill with salad and bread. Trin

Less than impressive. I was crying the blues last week because little black bugs got into a number of the turnips, that were growing well - I guess they thought so, too. Then quite a few of the tomatoes, which had been growing well, developed black leaves and stems, some of them on most of the plant, and where I hadn't been able to see the ground in part of the plot, and was preparing the staking for it, it got to where I could see the ground in a number of areas, and where they were thick, there were a number of stems and branches that were lying on the ground, some wet and rotting ... and some dry. I got up earlier than usual this morning, but instead of going out in the cool time, did a few things in the house and when I went out and began untangling some baler twine, it was so hot that I went inside of the shed where it was cooler. I need to add some strings to the pea vines and when I went to the south garden to do it there, found that the brace line from one of the end stakes had broken, so two at one end had fallen, letting all of the strings fall on both rows, with pea vines lying everywhere. I knew that I'd need to weed, so had taken the cultivator and did a lot of cultivating and pulling weeds from the peas, kohlrabi, peppers and watermelon. There's a huge amount of weeds yet needing to be pulled. I'll take the axe and chair down there soon to reposition the end stakes on the two rows of pea vines, then reposition the vines. I find that the edible pod vines grow much larger than the regular pea vines. Pea vines, one row and two rows of bean vines in the original garden need some more lines added, as well, and then there's more staking of the tomatoes, and cleaning out the crud from them ... a famous gardener told me on a radio phone-in on Monday to stake them, as they needed to have air circulate to stop the moulding. And, how does one remove the stuff that's contaminated without dropping spores off of them ... and avoiding touching the good parts of the plants with one's contaminated hands?? There are peas that need to be picked, and a bunch of beans, plus some lettuce and zucchini. Need to wash dishes, do a laundry and vacuum, as well. Plus - my right knee is showing out of my overalls, and I have some denim to patch it. Sometime when I can find some time. Also ... I need to sew some hook-and-loop fastener tape to some elastic so that I can make a retaining belt for my underwear briefs, several of which are so old that, the elastic having lost its zip, like to hang down around my knees: not very useful, when it's located like that! Need to get some milk, too. And some investment records that I keep are behind, as well. Oh, yes - I need to write a cheque for the Income Taxc people, as well ... they compound daily on amounts owing that are unpaid. I asked my furnace oil dealer the other day, who charge interest rate of 1.5 - 2.0% per month on unpaid balances after about 60 days, what rate they pay on credit balances, as they've held a credit in my account for several months. As it turns out that they pay zero per cent ... so I had them cut me a cheque and I need to deposit that. That should keep me busy for a while. ole joyful