Planted Seedling: Day 4

Word Count: 24,021

Summary of Events:

Brandt actually got up early on a Saturday, thanks to not being hung over, but didn't want what his stepmom was serving for breakfast, so he ended up asking Brandon if he could come over for breakfast. After lunch on Sunday Lark talked with her grandma about Brandt and her experience at the quading event. Brandt received word that the bonfire his friends had been planning was cancelled due to the rain, so he decided to go out with Lark to the Duchess Restaurant. Lark was picked up by Brandt and at the restaurant they got talking, the subject soon turning to Brandt's stepmom . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

""And I don't live on beer and bacon or anything," Brandt said. "Or fast food. You'd call me healthy, wouldn't you?"

"Yeah," Lark replied.

"I mean, there's nothing wrong with me," Brandt said. "I mean, unless you want to count the speeding tickets, but I haven't gotten once since I graduated high school, which was four years ago, so I should be okay. But yet there's always something wrong with me as far as Ron's concerned."

"Such as your diet," Lark said.

"Yeah," Brandt replied. "I just want to eat normal food, because you can be healthy on normal food, besides, we're too far from a fast food joint to justify going to McRaunchy's on a daily basis."

"The more homegrown your food the better," Lark said. "That's why we have a garden."

"And what do you grow in it?" Brandt asked.

"Peas, carrots, potatoes, beets occasionally, cucumbers, some radishes for Dad, onions, dill when we're planning on pickling, tomatoes, spaghetti squash," Lark replied. "We tried corn and pumpkins once each, but they didn't turn out so well. Grandma wants to give pumpkins another try being as we've gotten other squash to work, and we have started experimenting with different varieties. We tried purple tomatoes, so now we have some purple salsa. Oh yeah, and we usually do zucchini, but because we plant so few we think the seeds got too old on us, because they didn't come up this year, but it's not like we're hurting for zucchini or anything, we usually let them get over a foot long."

"Normal food, no eggplant, no spinach, no lettuce," Brandt said. "No sweet potatoes either."

"Never gotten into sweet potatoes," Lark said.

"Ron has a bit of a garden, but it's mostly weird stuff," Brandt said.

"Purple potatoes?" Lark asked.

"What?" Brandt asked.

"We grow purple potatoes," Lark replied. "We have for years. A church potluck's not complete without our purple potatoes."

"No, she doesn't grow stuff like that," Brandt said. "She doesn't do normal stuff with them either. She makes veggie burgers for her and the girls, and ground turkey burgers for me and Dad because red meat's not good for you."

"It's a source of iron," Lark said. "Which is particularly essential, and our body can get at the iron in red meat easier and better than the iron in things like spinach and broccoli."

"Besides, beef's good," Brandt said.

"It's just some of the additives that a lot of the fast food joints are now advertising that they remove or don't allow that are bad for us," Lark said. "It's all the chemicals in food for the sake of preserving it and carrying it to faraway places out of season that is harmful, the food itself is fine, although the convenience of the grocery store has made gardening — and even more home preservation — a lost art, although they're both making resurgences.""