10086 Sunset Boulevard

The best part of putting together a diet book is creating the dishes for the recipe section. Unless of course you get so carried away with the great healthy dishes you are creating that you take a little detour and gain back a few pounds….

This morning I took a drive out to Suisun Valley, driving past the vineyards, past the fields of sunflowers and out to Larry’s Produce stand where I can be sure to get a good selection of fresh fruits and vegetables for the recipes I’m working on. It’s my favorite place to shop for produce and it’s never dull there. I thought getting an early start to the day would mean that I would miss the crowds, but produce shopping was well underway by the time I arrived.

Larry’s is a large covered stand that smells of fresh cilantro. You can grab a bucket to carry your produce in or if you are really feeling ambitious you can load up a wheelbarrow.

I filled a bucket up with red onions, mushrooms, cauliflower, radishes, tomatoes, corn and nectarines. Next time I’ll be more adventurous and try out some of the red hot chili peppers and maybe even some cactus fruit. Anyone have a low carb cactus fruit recipe?

I’m back in the Valley of Northern California for a few days and it is 112 degrees as of this posting. I braved going out in the heat long enough to take this picture of the grapes growing on my Mother’s grapevine. I think they will all be ripe in about three minutes.

I’m falling in love with Nevada City all over again. The years I spent in this little gold mining town in the Sierra Foothills were the happiest years of my life. I don’t know if I can go back, but I have been wondering why I ever left.

I made a couple of visits to Pioneer Cemetery recently, driving up Broad Street, now full of tourists, and up the hill to the final resting place of those who once called this area home.

As usual, no one is around and I am free to roam and get lost in my thoughts. So many of the graveyard residents came from far away places to begin a new life in this town. They came to strike it rich during the California Gold Rush.

I notice two large empty beer bottles and an empty Jack Daniels bottle on one of the graves. The bottles had not been there when I visited the day before. I wonder who would consider boozing in the graveyard a way to spend a Friday night.

This cemetery has become my calm zone. I make my way through the trees to the miner’s graves, most of them marked by simple wooden crosses, with not much more than a last name to identify who lies beneath.

It is here that I am most at peace. I have to lie down to get pictures of the wooden markers. This is my third visit and my third try at photographing the crosses. Every time I’d load them on to my computer, they were blurred and out of focus. As I lie on the grass I say “come on guys, work with me here”. I finally get some clear shots and then I turn on my back, stretch out and look at the sky. I could sleep, I feel so peaceful.

I wonder if there is any law against napping in graveyards, but it’s the thought of tourists coming through the gate and seeing a body sprawled above ground that prompts me to my feet.

“Bye guys, see you later”.

If I move back to Nevada City, I’d like to volunteer to help take care of the cemetery. Maybe they need someone to pick up the empties after a weekend of drunken graveyard visitors.

I’m back up in the Sierra Foothills for a while. Here’s the view from above Nevada City. I might go into town tomorrow to watch the Fourth of July parade, or I might just stay right where I am up here in the trees.