Motatoes

Last year, I noticed one bushy little plant and another spiny looking plant growing in our backyard. We hadn't planted anything yet, but the one looked vaguely like a tomato and the other looked like onion. I left them, just to combat the urge that most desert dwellers have of removing all green things (as they are generally weeds). Turns out it was, in fact, a tomato and not, in fact, an onion. Still not sure what it is. This winter blessed us with a few hard freezes, so the tomato plant died, while the unidentified spiny thing still lives on, but not without bestowing some lovely tomatoes. None were ripe before I picked them in order to avoid the freeze, but after sitting in a sunny window long enough, they did ripen. Tasty!

Once we came to the runty, end of the line, last to ripen, tomatoes, I realized I should save some seeds. How does one save tomato seeds? A consult with Dr. Google revealed that the seeds must ferment in order to something, and such and such, and so forth. I understood enough to place the seeds in water for a while,  with regular rinsing, until scummy stuff starts growing and then go from there. Dutifully, I put the seeds in water on top of the fridge and ignored them... for several days, a lot of several days, until I noticed that a few, or all of them actually, were sprouting. Apparently the soak had worked and these were viable seeds. So we put them in a pot and now, for the first time ever, I have grown a tomato plant from seed. Proud moment. Hopefully they will survive to be more than the current 2 inch height.