When it comes to growing plants, I’m worse than a black thumb. I think I have no thumb. This summer we seemed to be doing well. We had a vigorous pot of cilantro, grown from seed. Then I bragged about the great salsa I made with it, and of course it immediately died.
We have a sunflower that grew about six feet tall. We watched the head grow every day, and just when it seemed ready to open, the plant fell over and the incipient inflorescence broke off. I reattached it with duct tape, which Iris found very entertaining. It sort of opened, as it dried up.
All of this is kind of painful to watch. Even though I know full well that plants don’t have brains, it is hard to watch an organism try to carry out its genetic program but be thwarted at every turn by me.
Then there’s the bean plant. Iris planted this ornamental bean plant, and it grew a vine over the railing of our balcony. Like most everything we plant, it grew well for a while and then died, but before it did, it produced exactly one bean pod. I forgot about it until yesterday, when Iris and I were out blowing bubbles and I noticed it was still there, although the pod was now brown and paper-thin. “Let’s open it,” I said. Check this out, and be sure to click and zoom in for the large size:
I’m going to cook it in a tablespoon of chicken stock, with 1g of bacon for flavor.
wowy…that is a fancy bean.
my ridiculous bean experience was semi-second-hand…a year or so before i married my husband, i sent his sister a birthday gift of those wicked adorable flowers-in-a-can…where it’s basically a pop can filled with dirt and seeds, and you pop the top off and water it, and eventually, theoretically, flowers grow.
i sent a couple of the flower kind, and one called “magic bean,” because how fun does that sound? it turns out the “magic” part is that somehow, magically, printed on to … i swear it was the leaf that unfolded once the bean grew … using lasers, or something… was, in gold, “i love you.” which is kind of an odd sentiment to express to your not-yet-future-sister-in-law on the occasion of her 26th birthday.
Lasers, I tell ya.
Your stock is going to dry up long before your bean is cooked – better increas that to a halp cup ;)
Don’t give up on the gardening, It just takes practice and a little diligence with proper placement and watering for the zone you live in. I’m right this very minute making tomato sauce with the bazillion ripe tomatoes I picked from my garden an hour ago. I’ve planted tomatoes here in the PNW for the past 5 years and this is the first truly successful year.
LOL this is hilarious.