This is the cover photo for a book detailing the progress of a year on Tonopah Rob’s Vegetable Farm in Tonopah, Arizona. Over the course of the last week, I have worked furiously to finish preparing the 240 photos on 100 pages that will fill this 11×15 (28x38cm) hardcover book. In between caring for my uncle, I would have a few moments here and there to jump into Photoshop and MyPublisher to finish in time to upload the book before MyPublisher’s 50% off deal expired. Well, the book is done and uploaded. If you would like to see more of my farm photography and read what I have been ghostwriting at his blog visit: http://www.tonopahrob.com. The book is a gift to Rob for Christmas and was commissioned by his best friend and farm manager Jerry.

Back in June, I wrote how I have found myself sixty miles from home out west in the small community of Tonopah, Arizona, volunteering on a small all-natural farm. Then the Summer heat put a stop to that as outdoor work became next to impossible. As Summer drew to a close, my uncle broke his hip and I missed the preparatory work that went into bringing the farm back into shape for the Fall/Winter season. Today I am driving back to Santa Barbara to help my uncle as tomorrow is the day he will be released from the nursing/rehabilitation center and go home. On my way out west to Southern California, I stopped by the farm to check progress and torture myself with all that I have missed out on. In two weeks Rob will reopen the farm stand which will be expanded into a mini farmers market with a number of new vendors on hand. My time at the farm was brief as I still had another 450 miles ahead of me.

Three hundred plus pounds and counting, that’s how many tomatoes I’ve taken home from my volunteering out on the farm. What do three hundred pounds of tomatoes look like? Well, the boxes in today’s photos hold about eleven and a half pounds each, which equates to twenty-seven flats of tomatoes which would stand seven and a half feet tall. So, what does one do with that many tomatoes? One gets busy, that’s what. I’ve made stewed tomatoes, canned whole tomatoes, pasta sauce, basil and bell pepper pasta sauce, V8 tomato juice, dried tomatoes, and tomato salads. We’ll be eating the sweet taste of summer well into next year, I can assure you.

Took a big bag of assorted peppers including jalapeno, poblano, Hungarian wax, anaheim, some bells, and a few I could not identify from Tonopah Rob’s vegetable farm where I have been volunteering and visited my friend Nelson over at Mi Pueblo Mexican restaurant where he threw them under the fire and roasted them smokey black before I turned them into salsa.