Welcome to the Dollhouse

Our apartment is a mess. I mean, not a Southern belle's idea of a mess, where the white glove may be slightly dusty upon swiping a surface. Not even my mother's concept of the word, which includes a little hair behind the bathroom door, but an honest to God, unholy MESS. Not a single room is spared.

Our four pet fancy rats (Daisy, Effie, Ginger and Pepper) look at us disapprovingly each time we walk by their cage on the way to add to our ENORMOUS pile of laundry skulking in our closet. This should tell you something about how messy our mess has become.

And yet . . . the farmer's market is open and there are strawberries, people! REAL strawberries - not the genetically mutated MONSTER berries you get at Kroger, but the small, precious, infinitely delicate rubies that come from the dirt of Marty's farm. God knows how he keeps the birds and the pigs off them, but this weekend he had a dozen pints of the most heady smelling berries I've ever had the pleasure to suck down in one sitting. I swear, there's nothing that can reaffirm one's faith like a strawberry. I wrote a poem about it, once. So did my husband, which I found hillarious, for some reason. Great minds? Maybe.

Needless to say, the dishwasher did get run, and even though the stack of plates and bowls waiting in the sink reminded me of some study on the layers of the earth, I stuck them all in the machine just so I could spend an afternoon cooking.

While I was excavating our sink I imagined a scene something like a Magic Schoolbus epsiode where Ms. Frizzle says: "See? This dish-cliff face is striated! You can tell how old this stack of dishes is by counting the layers on muck! This monolithic pile of porcelain is ANCIENT!" Hm. My poor mother. She'd be revolted, though not surprised, I'm sure.

But come on! Housework is NOTHING compared to a good farmer's market! CL and I had so much fun blowing our weekly $30 that I'm willing to overlook the filthy bathrooms, the vaguely scary desks piled with magazines, bills and other paperwork! The experience was well worth the aftermath of a still filthy home.

We spent all of 20 minutes at the market, but what a 20 minutes it was - yellow squash (Perfet! Organically grown in cow poo! Without a blemish!) two gorgeous pickling cucumbers (HUGE, I might add, and sweet like honeysuckle water), a loaf of still-warm French Country sourdough bread - infinitely more satisfying than cleaning up our space, no?

Here, friends, is one fruit of our weekend labors:

Summer Bean Salad

wax beans and small greenbeans - however many you want to scarf down - blanched in salt water until just tender, then drained
cherry tomatoes or grape tomatoes (halved) - enough to strike a pleasing balance with the beans

Champagne Vinaigrette
2 tbsp. or however much you need, if you've got lots of beans and 'maters to dress
4 tbs. orange champagne vinegar
1 tsp. finely chopped shallot
2 tsp. finely chopped fresh basil
salt and pepper

Toss the beas and the tomatoes in the vinaigrette and enjoy, mon amis! Best if it sits for an hour before you indulge.

Now, let loose with that joi de vive!