Greens ‘n things

So I hear the east coast is having some weather (much weather! 30 Rock fans? Shall we conversation? No?) Has anyone else heard this? Rain and wind, I think they said. Maybe the news will spend a minute discussing it or I’ll see if I can find it mentioned on the Internets somewhere, we’ll see.

Sarcasm aside, I hope all resolves itself soon, bad weather sucks and is making me dread thinking about the other four-letter “s” word that’s coming sooner than I’d like. But in the meantime, I’m making salad with the last of the really beautiful lettuce I picked up over the weekend.

Lettuce seems like such an insignificant thing to get excited about. It’s usually relegated to the ubiquitous side salad, pale green and lacking flavor, or added as an afterthought to a burger just to get peeled off after it’s warm and soggy. What a sin.

Fall in five senses

I’m not ashamed to admit it–this time of year, I will let out my inner five-year-old and happily high-kick my way through a pile of leaves as they crunch under my feet. Out of all four seasons, the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations of fall are my favorites. I’ve made it pretty clear that I love summer, but there is something about the way fall hits all of my senses at once that gets me every time.

The sound of dry leaves skipping down the street in the wind is so unique and only comes this time of year for a few short weeks. The colors make me want to climb a tree and live in the sun-bright yellow, pumpkin-orange, cranberry-red leaves clinging to nut-brown branches, which match the colors flooding the market during its last few weeks outdoors. The smells–burning leaf piles (not as much in the city, but something I remember distinctly growing up), the earthy scent of wet leaves as they start to decompose back into the soil, getting ready for spring–fill the air.

Cheese and crackers

The last weekend of August is about to kick off, and I still haven’t accepted that September is only a few days away. Although rain and cool weather are forecast for most of the weekend, that won’t stop me from getting as much outdoors-y time as I can, maybe even at the beach, and trying to get in as many last-minute summer dishes as I have time to make and space in my stomach for before I give in to fall, apples, sweaters, squash, spices, tea.

Salad for a heat wave

I love summer, and I declare it proudly. After the winters that I’ve lived with all my life in Rochester and now Chicago, I have no complaints when the temperature goes above 80, 90, even 100. I leave my air conditioning off for as long as I can possibly stand it; I hate wearing weather-appropriate clothes and then freezing as soon as I go inside a building.