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Executive Times |
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2006 Book Reviews |
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The $64
Tomato by William Alexander |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click on
title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Indulgence Any reader who
enjoys a hobby will empathize with the large amount of money that William
Alexander has spent on gardening, as he describes in his book, The $64 Tomato.
After he computed how much the costs came out to per tomato following one
summer’s poor crop, he came up with the title of this book. Homeowners who
are not gardeners may also enjoy reading about the surprises the Alexanders faced with their new home and land, and the
reputation of the house around town. Here’s an excerpt, one of my favorite
descriptions of life with tree rats, from the end of the chapter titled, “You
May Be Smarter, But He’s Got More Time,” pp. 123-130: The only animal I have
seen that is more persistent than a groundhog is a squirrel. One summer day,
we had some guests over for lunch. As we were sitting on our porch
overlooking the orchard and admiring the serenity of a perfect summer
afternoon, we saw a squirrel hop into the orchard, scamper up a tree, bite
off a golf-ball-size apple, and scamper away. Cute. Our suburban guests were
very amused by this quaint display of country life. Five minutes later they
were amused again. And five minutes later, again. And so on, like clockwork.
They were hysterical. I was beside myself. I did a little math in my head: 12
apples an hour times, say, five hours a day equals 60 apples a day, equals
420 apples a week. If this kept up at even half the pace we were witnessing,
the orchard would be cleaned out in a week. I’d had my trees for
several years at this point and had never seen squirrels stealing the crop
before. But the past spring and summer had been devastatingly dry. Farmers
without irrigation had no crops. Towns had instituted water restrictions. I
surmised that the squirrel was using the apples as a source of water. But what to do? He
might have been ready to pick the apples, but I sure wasn’t; they were still
a good few weeks from maturity. I needed to get to the Agway, and fast. We
were on dessert. Surely our visitors would be leaving soon. Anne offered seconds
of peach pie. “No thanks!” I practically
yelled before anyone else could answer. “Too rich!” Anne glared at me. “I could sit here all
afternoon;’ said one guest, sighing, as Anne brought more pie. I almost
choked. “And this pie is fantastic. But we’ll have to get going soon?’ That
was more like it. They had stopped by on their way upstate and still had a
two-hour trip ahead of them. “How much
of a drive do you figure we have from here?” Anne
started to answer, “No more than two—” “Four
hours;’ I interrupted. Our guests
exchanged a look. “At least’
I added as I watched the squirrel out of the corner of my eye. “Traffic, you
know?’ From behind the visitors, Anne grimaced and made a slashing motion
across her throat, which I took to mean either “Cut it out;’ or “I’m going to
kill you when this is over?’ Our guests
were still waving from their car as I hopped in mine and sped down to the
Agway. I told my tale to the pest expert there. “You don’t
say!” he declared. “I’ve never heard of that. Hey, Rich! “He called over
another salesman. “You got to hear this?’ I had to repeat the story to Rich,
which cost me at least two more apples. He asked where I lived. I started to
describe the place. “Not the
Big Brown House!” he exclaimed. “You still have sheep?” “Sheep?” “Yeah, Kreske kept sheep so he could classify it as a farm. Cut
his property taxes in half. And he didn’t have to cut the grass.” Or
fertilize, I imagine. This was a story I’d have to come back for, but minutes
were passing and apples disappearing. 1 got Rich back to the problem at
hand, and we mulled over the options. There was pepper spray. (“But I’ve got
to eat the apples, too;’ I reminded them. They assured me it came off with
soap and water.) We considered bird netting, but a net large enough to drape
over an entire tree with enough left to secure at the base cost fifty
dollars, and I had four trees to cover. Two hundred dollars would buy a lot
of apples at the farm stand. I couldn’t bring myself to spend two hundred
dollars to try (and possibly fail) to protect trees with no more than fifty
dollars’ worth of apples on them, so I left with the pepper spray for ten
bucks. This stuff was supposed to be hot: “Keep from face and eyes;’ the
bottle cautioned. I drenched the apples in pepper spray. Apparently
the squirrel had watched me from afar, for the moment I left the orchard, he
bounded in, grabbed a The
experience brought back bad memories
of my first battle with squirrels, years ago in our first house in So did a
pair of squirrels we came to call Chip and Dale. On our very first
morning—very early morning— we learned two things without leaving our bed:
(1) the New York State Thruway was a lot
closer than we realized: we could hear the trucks shifting gears in the
predawn; and (2) we were not alone. The pitter-patter of little feet directly
overhead was our first clue that Chip and Dale were well established in the
attic and, for all I knew (assuming that unlike their Disney namesakes, Dale
was a female), planning on starting a family. Time to evict. I settled
on an absolutely foolproof strategic approach. First I found where I thought
they were getting in and out: a small gap in a valley on the roof. I brought
in plaster and chicken wire but did not seal the hole up yet. I wanted to
catch and remove the squirrels and then
quickly seal up the opening. I bought my first Havahart
trap (the “squirrel model”), baited it with peanuts, and waited. And waited.
A week later, we were still waking to the sound of highway and squirrels. And then,
one Saturday morning, we awoke to a new sound: the rattle of a cage. Victory!
This was the first creature I had ever trapped, and I hadn’t yet learned to
drive it two counties away, so I took it to a small park a few blocks away
and released it. Back at the house, I inspected the attic. Empty. This is
what I had hoped for and expected, for we rarely heard the squirrels during
the middle of the day, when I presume they were out gathering nuts or
stealing apples. I worked the chicken wire into the gap, slathered the whole
thing in plaster, and opened a beer. Well, that wasn’t so bad. Sunday
morning, we woke to the sounds of eighteen-wheeler transmissions . . . and
pitter-patter above our heads. We still had a squirrel in the attic. I’ll
venture a guess and say it was Dale. Why? Because I heard another sound: the
sound of a squirrel scratching on glass. I went outside and looked up. Chip,
the gallant fellow, had found his way back from the park (probably before I
had) and was desperately trying to rescue Dale. Now, it’s quite possible I
have this backward, but because I was raised on notions of classical chivalry,
I’m going to stick to the assumption that the female was stuck inside, and
the male was trying to claw his way back in. And he didn’t work on the glass
for long. He soon moved to the window frame itself and started to eat his way through it. Now, this was
truly alarming. We had owned this house less than two weeks, and a lovesick
squirrel was eating it up. It was interesting that he had chosen the frame
to break through, not some other weak point in the roof (and I’m sure there
were plenty). Did he choose the window because he could see his beloved on
the other side as he gnawed? Years later it seems quite touching, actually,
and I wish I could have reunited them, but at the time it was nothing short
of terrifying. We were afraid to open the front door, for fear he would shoot
through and make for the attic. It was like living Hitchcock’s The Birds, only with squirrels. I set up
the trap in the attic again, now in a race against time. Dale, however, was
lying low. Each day, meanwhile, Chip got a little farther into the frame as I
watched helplessly. So this is home
ownership, I thought ruefully. I wanted to call the landlord, to yell at
the super. But they were both me. Eventually,
after a few tense days, Dale got hungry enough to overcome her reservations
and ventured into the trap. I released her far, far away, and the instant she
was removed, Chip stopped gnawing. I examined the frame. He was only another
day from breaking through, and I faced a considerable repair job. Amazing. The most
valuable lesson I learned from this experience came not from the squirrels
but from a work colleague, a thoughtful Irishman with wire-rimmed glasses
and a snow-white mane and beard. Jim is only a hundred pounds removed from
being Santa Claus. My co-workers during this period were receiving daily
updates on Squirrel Wars, much to their delight. Most of them considered it
all a real hoot, some demonstrating their sympathy and wit by whistling the Rocky and Bullwinkle theme each time I
passed them in the hail. On the day that Chip was within a half inch of
reaching Dale, I sat in Jim’s office, despondent, looking for an answer. Jim
listened to me for a while, stroking his beard thoughtfully and staring at
the ceiling. “The
problem is’ he finally said, pushing his glasses up on his nose, “you may be
smarter, but he’s got more time.” Truer
words were never spoken. After
watching my current peppery-apple-loving squirrel make
a couple of more raids on my apples, I couldn’t stand it anymore. I settled
on a compromise solution: netting two of the trees and preemptively picking
all the apples off the others. We made several apple pies with the tiny, tart
apples. Then, predictably, the squirrel got hung up in the netting. I was
able to untangle him without harm to either man or beast, and I guess he
learned his lesson, because on his next trip back he chose to go for the
apples in—believe it or not—the Havahart. I took
him far, far away, but I know he—or his kin—will be back. Next Saturday, go to your local Farmers
Market, buy a few pounds of heirloom tomatoes for a few bucks, then come home
and read The $64 Tomato.
Steve Hopkins,
July 26, 2006 |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the August 2006
issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/The
$64 Tomato.htm For Reprint Permission,
Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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