Happy Saturday!

I am hopefully in China by now and not getting eaten alive by mosquitoes but I am writing this post on Thursday, just in case.

This week has not been easy for me. Let me tell you why.

First, work was especially busy. It was as if people knows I am going away. There were card payments to be taken, invoices to be sent, and questions to be answered? Or perhaps, it’s because it’s the beginning of another month?

Secondly, while there’s not much work to be done in the garden (or rather can do), it feels like there’s always work somewhere, like pruning the bushes or planting more seeds for autumn. To be honest though, I’ve been planting since July and while plants are growing, they are growing slowly, just waiting for the cooler weather, I guess. Just a few more days, plants, just a few more days and you will get your cooler weather.

Then, there’s the case with my mom. I’ve mentioned this in past posts but I’ve been automating the garden, preparing for this trip. You can call me a control freak but I like things to be done in a particular way – at work or at home. I like my plants to be watered at the soil-level, not the leaf-level. It’s why I installed drip irrigation all over the garden, so plants can get water every 2 or 3 days instead of everyday or sometimes, even twice a day.

Every time I tried to give my uncle or aunt a tutorial on the watering system, however, my mom would cut in and tell her siblings “do whatever you want.” Then later, she would tell me if they can’t figure it out, they will just water with a hose.

“Ahem, excuse me, what is so hard about shoving a quick connect into the faucet and pressing a few buttons?” I argued. Sure a hell lot more easier than watering with a hose for sure.

The other thing I asked my relatives to do was to refill the ollas and water-tanks for the front garden drip systems, which are on a timer to be ran for 20 minutes every 24 hours. Again, something anyone can do, right? I don’t know why my mom want to baby her siblings. “Oh, you can do it if you want.” She never did that to me. I guess I now have try to monitor the health of my garden from the security cameras.

Ugh, my brain is absolutely exhausted. I’ve been listening to complaints after complaints from my aunt and my mom all morning. I had my noise-cancelling headphones over my ears but they were so loud that it was unavoidable. They complained about anything and everything, mostly about my garden, which was difficult to listen to. My mom complained about the bland-tasting French melon I picked last night while my aunt complained about my vegetables being tough.

“Eat them young,” that’s my aunt’s motto for just about everything – animals, vegetables, sea creatures. It’s absolutely cruel.

She harvested my vegetables by pulling every leaf until you can only see a nub of the plant’s heart. And you know what? I didn’t want her to harvest my vegetables. These were my fall vegetables, I needed them to get matured enough to be harvested in late fall, early winter, not right now. That’s when vegetables taste the best, anyways. Right now, most of them are just bitter because of the hot temperature.

Anyway, thanks to Natalie for hosting WeekendCoffeeShare and I hope you have a wonderful week ahead.