Sunsets and pumpkins

On the drive home from the winery 

The late-summer thunderclouds have arrived and along with them the gorgeous fall skies (good) and more humid weather (not-so-good).  There are aphids, whiteflies and powdery mildew on the squash, but at this point we're all pretty done with squash so it's not necessarily a bad thing.  The pumpkin patch is going strong, and the tomatoes just keep coming and coming.

One thing I am considering is something Big Ag recommended regarding my tomatoes.  Instead of letting them continue on indefinitely until the first frost, I'm going to pull water on them soon, so they all ripen at the same time.  It's true that I won't have tomatoes for Thanksgiving salads, but on the other hand, with the entire crop getting ripe at once, it will help with canning chores.  And since one of my tomato beds is going to have carrots planted in it, it will also allow me to get those in the ground without having to wait too long.  Nights will be getting colder soon, and they'll need a little time to get started before it turns really cold.

I love the fact that the seasons are turning once again at this point, being stuck in the height of any one season is never my favorite thing.  Unless, of course, it's fall.  As much as we love living in wine country, I still think it would be amazing to live in a place with a true fall, which lasted for a few months instead of weeks.  But does it?  So many of my friends who live in cold-weather climes complain that fall there ends too abruptly as well, especially when they get an early snowfall.

Perhaps fall is loved more than the other seasons because of its brevity.  That's certainly true for me.