the dying breaths of leo season
i am not ready for virgo szn, even though it’s already here. i am mourning, as ㅎ said, the dying breaths of leo season. even though i didn’t love the record-breaking several weeks of intense heat thanks to climate change, i did love the long weekends, long walks, dry grass, bodies of water, wearing shorts and sandals, stone fruit, BLTs, sunlight forever.
is there any bad fruit worse than a bad watermelon? i cracked one open today and saw a chasm of mealy skin: dry, grainy, a rasp of little crystals under your palm when it should be super wet (that’s what she said). a bad peach is disappointing, sure, flat and mushy, but a watermelon is an investment. you’ve allocated a certain amount of fridge space, your largest glass container or two or three, a slice of your day, a certain preparation of the counter since it’s going to be a mess, the knife labor, the cleanup.
the texture gave me the ick, as they say in love island, so i knew i wouldn’t be able to eat it. i learned, while googling, that overripe watermelons get dry and mealy. i always thought they were just unlucky, like one out of seven is mealy, but no! maybe a couple days out in the kitchen on days over 90 degrees tipped it over the edge. anyway, i didn’t feel like making popsicles, so i found an aguas frescas recipe, which is quite simple: blend watermelon and water, strain, then make simple syrup and add it to taste. it’s very refreshing on ice.