Blueberry White Chocolate + Thyme Scones

Summer held its breath until the 13th hour. Finally, upon exhalation, the weather is sticky, languid as molasses...deliciously perfect. I'm odd to relish humidity and that spot on the small of the back which never completely dries during (and after) meandering through a non-air conditioned farm house. But I am in love with summer, even especially during her passionate fits of temper. Yesterday was particularly ethereal + lush; a spirited mix of hazy sunlight and distant reverberating thunder. My red entry door, now flushed and expanded with heat, brushes fiercely against the sisal rug. I find wicked amusement in hearing people huff and occasionally curse when, upon swift entry, they're met by an immobile rug + a pregnant door. It's also proving to be an excellent alarm system and gives me ample time to hide baked goods from prying hands. Sometimes the most exhausting element of food blogging is simply keeping people (and photobombing cats) away long enough to snap pictures.
    
My next recipe, if I can stop eating the star player, will be a raspberry something. For now, as you can see, I'm still riding the sanguine blueberry wave. Scones don't require too much baking sorcery but they are difficult to photograph. No worries, I will not bore you with more photography angst, but I hope it's okay to experiment with both light & dark backgrounds/moods. My cheeky heart inadvertently strays to the dark side, but I'm attempting to build bridges with the bright and airy.

Midnight in Paris Blueberry + Mint Pie

"A light white, a disgras, an inkspot, a rosy charm." 
     ~ Gertrude Stein, Tender Buttons: Objects, Food, Rooms

August is a matchstick. It burns too fast and too hot and I'm never ready for pensive September. The lion of August has not been its usual fiery, passionate self - which only makes me more anxious. After finally falling in step with the bass rhythm of summer, I'm utterly ill-prepared for autumn. The errant back to school ads that popped up in mid-July were noxious. We're constantly thrust forward at a stomach-lurching pace while trying to heed the contrary advice of enjoying the moment we're "in." It's manic and disquieting and I wish I could wish back the month of May and to spend my re-summer in Paris. Since I'm surrendering completely to fiction, preferably 1920's Paris; surrounded by Hemingway (I know he would find my writing too floral), Eliot, Stein, and, of course, Fitzgerald (oh, if he happened to be Tom Hiddleston fulfilling a similar wish...).

Alas, it's mid August and I'm not sipping wine at a café in Montparnasse. Luckily I am surrounded by local farmer's markets, and as I nurse a too-sugary, not at all French, caramel macchiato, if I let my imagination take the reins, I can *almost* imagine I'm strolling through a cobblestone Parisian side street; surrounded by the aroma of artisan bread, fresh peaches, plums, and melons. The only missing petal is a cheesemonger.

Strawberry + Thyme Crumb Bars

"There's a soft spot in everything 
our fingers touch,
                               the one place where everything breaks
when we press just right.
The past is like that, with its arduous edges and blind sides,
the whorls of our fingertips
                              embedded along its walls
like fossils the sea has left behind."

                               ~ Charles Wright, from "Two Stories," The Other Side of the River 

I am my own worst enemy and most disparaging critic; this, I know. When it comes to my blog, everything grazes against receptive skin and can either make my day or mar an entire late-summer week. Of course, being me, I tend to roost upon the abrasive. I build a thorny nest of crooked twig-shaped (fictitious) slights and peck jagged holes through my own words and photos; especially the photos.