Well, almost 10 days ago, I posted that I was working on over-fermenting some Ba-Tampte Pickled Tomatoes according to my grandmother’s old “recipe”. My father told me that if I left them out on a counter they would start to react and the juice would foam and eventually overflow the jar which would signal that they were ready.

Nine days later and no such luck. They are in almost exactly the same state, while smelling very much like what I remember, aside from the fact that there is now a little bit of action going on at the bottom of the jar.

I’m sorta embarrassed that I wasn’t able to get something as easy as “leave the jar on the counter with the lid slightly ajar for ten days” to work. I normally take great pride in my cooking skills and while this isn’t really “cooking”, I still expected that it would come out on my first try.

Based on my brother-in-law’s comment that he wanted to hear the review of the emergency room after I ingested these, I have now decided to ditch the current experiment and start over from scratch. The only possible thing I could think that I did wrong was eating one of the tomatoes and adding more pepper and garlic to the mix. Maybe I changed Grandma’s recipe too much to get the reaction started?

In the end, I will win — some way, some how I will figure out how to get those delicious treats into my mouth to bring back the fond memories of sitting in the middle of my grandparents’ kitchen table staring at spread before me with my mouth watering for the tomatoes.

According to this article in Thisweek-Online (and in print which was delivered to my doorstep — wet), Watson’s in Apple Valley is likely to be acquired by the Minnesota Valley Transit Authority under an action approved by the Dakota County commissioners to increase the parking available for the nearby transit station.

There has been a growing issue with the number of bus riders parking on adjacent streets in order to ride the bus downtown. In the past, riders parking in the Watson lot as well as plenty of other businesses in the area. Watson’s disallowed parking in their lots which has only made Watson’s look far more empty than it normally is. Honestly, even on weekends I have only seen a handful of cars in their large expanse of a lot. Kim and I have joked that it’s nothing but a drug front because there’s no way that selling a few pools a year could make up for the huge costs of maintaining that retail location.

Andre Prefontaine, owner of Watson’s, is disappointed in the low ball assessed value of the 50,000 square foot property on 10 acres suggested by the MVTA ($4.57 million) and while he’s willing to work with the MVTA and County on this (more like he doesn’t have a choice in the matter), he’s still upset — and rightfully so.

I’m no fan of eminent domain myself and I think that a several fair assessments need to be done before this deal closes officially but if Watson’s hadn’t banned parking in their empty lot we might not even be at this point now.

I went to a Higher Education Usergroup for RightNow Technologies for work today and it took place on the 50th floor of the IDS tower in Minneapolis. I didn’t know that going in as the invitation just said the Marquette Hotel, so I wasn’t exactly prepared with a camera, but I did take a few shots w/the hiptop.

I didn’t feel the building sway or anything as some of the attendees were complaining about but I did have my ears pop as I went up or down in the elevator and I did get dizzy looking straight down at the city streets directly below.

I have to go back tomorrow for a half-day to finish up the conference and I will be bringing the real camera. Maybe it will be a nicer day with less clouds — the forecast says otherwise but after this past weekend, I trust the weathermen even less than ever.

See all the pictures from today here (mobile) and here (camera).