Tomato eulogy

My friends, the baby tomato in the accompanying photo has been decapitated and gutted. I found it this morning on the patio, just as shown, eight feet from the plant that gave it life, mercilessly shorn from the comforts of parental embrace.

And now, importantly, never to garnish a salad or grace human palate.

Regular readers already know where this little eulogy is going.

Your author – the 30-Second Read chief writer – has scribbled twice before about that tomato plant.

First, he lamented the loss of tomatoes to backyard critters. He blamed chipmunks. The evidence, while circumstantial, seemed strong enough to overcome reasonable doubt. The chief writer declared war on chipmunks.

Next, reacting to reader feedback, your author demurred. Suggestions included measures tantamount to massacre. He declared a chipmunk détente.

Yesterday, the chief writer’s wife saw a chipmunk in the tomato plant. Not on the soil in the oversized planter. Up in the plant. Up in the plant!

Then came this morning’s grim discovery. A dark day in Weedy Gulch.

Neither threats nor détente have worked.

’Tis time to buy tomatoes.