Peach Pickin' Pictures

Ah, August. Peach season.

There's nothing like tree-ripened peaches. They're kind of one of those things for me like, say, blue flax. Or Yoda. Or maple syrup. You know.

So every August I try to procure some fresh peaches.

For years I lived in Idaho, near a fruit stand that sold half bushels for $5. I understand they've gone up a little in price since then, but hasn't everything? Anyway, they were big, they were juicy, and they were cheap. I usually bought 3 to 5 bushels and canned them. My family loves canned peaches.

So I saw this sign on the way to Shannon's house last week for pick-your-own peaches at 60 cents a pound. That sounded good to me-- you can't buy any kind of fruit in the grocery store for 60 cents a pound here. And I love messing around in orchards. So off I went to get me some peaches. I took Bean with me.

My cousin Michelle and her boyfriend wanted to come too. I thought it was cool that they wanted to go pick peaches for a Saturday night date. My kind of people.

However, prairie peaches are not like Idaho peaches. Instead of trees loaded large, there were trees lightly speckled with gimpy peaches. We really had to work to fill our baskets.

We climbed ladders...

...We used funky picker thingers...

We worked for an hour and didn't even get a full bushel because the fruit was tiny. Our basket cost $23, which made Idaho look even more like the proverbial greener pasture. But we still had a good time,

and the peaches were definitely not lacking that perfect sunshiney flavor.