Sitting with us on our back porch, enjoying our porch swing, our neighbor announced that no one should be inside on a day like yesterday (low 54, high 82, sunny, breezy, low humidity). When I'm working I'm afraid I hardly notice the weather, unless a breeze sweeps through the window and disturbs my papers. But she was quite right.
We began the day with a trip to the Winter Park Farmer's Market. Farmer's markets are not as much fun in Central Florida as I've experienced in other places: for the most part, agriculture has moved too far away from us, and if you look carefully at that fresh-looking piece of fruit you just might discover that it was harvested in Guatemala. Some so-called farmer's markets resemble a craft show with food vendors more than a place to find the ingredients for your next meal.The market in Winter Park is better than most around here, and a great place to stroll through on a lovely day. We breakfasted on crêpes (mushroom/spinach/Swiss cheese), the best I've had since Paris and enjoyed wandering amongst the many plant and flower vendors as well as the produce stands and food booths. At Winter Park Honey we picked up a jar of pricy ($15/lb.) but sublime Blackberry Twist honey. That's not honey with blackberry flavoring added, but organic, raw, unfiltered honey produced by bees who have supped (sipped?) on the nectar of blackberry flowers. You will not believe how wonderful it tastes.
We admired the Winter Park Dairy booth. Theyhad some of their lovely-looking artisan, raw-milk, bleu cheese for sale. Unfortunately, I don't care for bleu cheese, but after having tasted a sample I can say that if I were to grow to like bleu cheese, this would be it. They usually sell "100% natural, un-pasteurized, un-homogenized, pasture grazed, pesticide free, growth hormone & antibiotic free" milk as well (labelled, as per Florida law, "Not for Human Consumption - Pet Treat"), but something had gone wrong with the batch and they had none to offer this time.
We shared an almond croissant (tasty, but unlike the crêpes was not good enough to bring France to mind), ran into some old friends and traded stories of our children's exploits since high school, then picked up a loaf of artisan bread and a half gallon of unpasteurized tangerine juice before making the pleasant walk to our car.
Saturday was also a good day for yardwork: clearing the roof of leaves, and raking, sweeping, and bagging a small portion of the leaves in our yard. Yes, those of you who envy our snow-free lives might consider that here the leaves fall plentously from our trees not once but twice each year. We use our snow shovels to scoop them into bags. Porter also removed a three-trunked camphor tree that had sprung up in our backyard; it was too shaded to grow properly itself, yet had reached the point where it was shading an oak tree we wanted to cultivate. After much-appreciated showers, we returned to the above-mentioned porch swing and enjoyed some time reading together, and still more time with Porter reading and me celebrating the drowsy, summer-like day by...drowsing.
My nap was not sufficient to keep me from nodding off in parts of the evening's Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra concert, but it helped. The Artistry of André Watts featured—who else?—André Watts performing Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4, as well as the Sibelius Symphony No. 5 and Ravel's Le Tombeau de Couperin. This was either not one of the OPO's most inspired programs or I was unusually picky, for if nothing was wrong, few things really seemed right. And why couldn't they have presented such an oboe-heavy program while we still had Jared Hauser? I'm sure our new principal oboe did a fine job on the difficult Tombeau; there's nothing I can find to fault, except that...well, I guess that she wasn't Jared. I don't know. But if it wasn't an awesome concert, it's always delightful to end the day with music.
Lovely weather, delicious food, hard work, inspiring books, and good music, followed by a pleasant night's sleep. Can't be beaten.
