Another milestone

It's hot this week.

Here's what the conditions were like yesterday evening, courtesy of my beloved Weather Underground. Check out that dew point!

And here's the forecast for later in the week. Could this really be true? I think it might change, but the trio of 99s boggled my mind.

Though it's easier to manage (and even appreciate) at the end of the summer, when we know cooler conditions are around the corner, I just ran 3.5 miles and it felt like about 12. The heat wave's timing is also less than ideal for college students moving into their dorms and for the State Fair crowds over at the fairgrounds this week.

But some things love the heat, including our garden. As soon as the days got warmer again last week, the tomatoes started turning colors beautifully and rapidly. The cherry tomatoes seem like they're going from green to red in the span of a day or two.

Drumroll, please! The first round of heirloom tomatoes are ready!

We went to the garden on Sunday afternoon and harvested two big bright red heirlooms. I am especially proud of these guys because they started as small and kind of fragile plants given to me by my cousin, and through the cool early weeks of summer, I wasn't sure they were going to make it. It was a huge relief to even see them flower. And now they're full of big tomatoes!

We skipped turning on the oven last night and sent caprese sandwiches, complete with those red tomatoes, straight to the grill. I have high hopes for the rest of the heirloom crop and intend to strike a 50-50 balance of using them in recipes versus eating them whole with a little dusting of salt. I am very excited.