B E B E R E

Nine jars of peach jam, all of which are already spoken for...I should start selling jelly shares like some sell farm shares.

Although someone beat me to the wild grapes this last time around (how maddening to smell that Concord perfume, follow your nose and find that the only fruit left is thirty or forty feet up?), I did get a nice consolation prize of a few quarts of elderberries and a bag of feral pears. A trip to Cold Spring Orchard netted me six quarts of a glorious Concord variant called "Mars," a couple pints of a miniature plum that was sweeter than candy and a butternut squash.

Now that the weather's cooling down some, I can start cooking again. Between all these goodies, the several pints of pincherries and the crabapples, I'll have plenty to keep me off the streets.