Noche de San Juan

I've been looking at photographs from last night's celebrations in Spain on "El Huffington Post" (crazy that The Huffington Post is taking over the world... do check out the photos, though) and it sure looked like fun. I celebrated quietly here at home, lit a couple of candles and washed my face after midnight with ritualistic deliberation. Small stuff. 

     

Apart from the fire and water rituals, I did some "gathering of midsummer herbs". And rather than go tromping around in the surrounding hills and hollows up here in the mountains in the middle of the night, risking poison oak, mountain lion attack*, and wolf spider terrors**, just so I could come home with a handful of California sagebrush that, now that I think of it, grows in my own yard, I decided to plant my own batch of cooking herbs. I didn't get a chance to start up the veggie patch this spring, so this little herb collection will have to do for now. The symbolism isn't quite right, but we tend to have long Indian summers and annuals generally thrive with occasional bud pinching through the New Year, no need to start drying herbs now. 

Damn, I forgot to buy the sage!!!

I'm a lazy person, so I haven't transplanted them to the pots next to the kitchen door yet. Tomorrow. I've never grown/eaten/cooked with Cuban basil before; it's supposed to be similar to any sweet basil, but with a spicy flavor. Intriguing! Even better, it's a perennial.

And just in case you thought that I didn't end up having any St. John's magic come my way (or just a stroke of ordinary good luck), I stopped by my next door neighbors' yard sale on the way back from the farm & feed, and ended up leaving with a little treasure:

FANCYYY

Howard gave me a ridiculously good deal. As I gave him the cash for the typewriter, I blurted out, "Up in the Mission District in San Francisco, you wouldn't be able to find one of these for under $100!" SUCH A DUMB THING TO SAY. It needs a new ribbon, but all the keys and doodads seem to work, and it's really just beautiful. I'll post some proper photos once I'm finally able to test it out.

Addendum: I mixed up the two thymes in the photo identifying the midsummer herbs. The Orange Thyme is top center, and the French Thyme is bottom left. OOPSIES.

* There have been sightings of a lone adolescent mountain lion roaming around the neighborhood in the past week -- at dusk and at night, but sometimes during the day. We're hoping s/he's just passing through on the way to discovering new territories.
** Don't even dare do a Google image search -- DON'T YOU DO IT IT'S TOO TERRIBLE.