Friday Oct 12 The neighbor from whom I took the green tomatoes delivers a thank you note

On Tuesday, as I was walking to the bus stop, I noticed someone had left a bunch of yanked-out tomato plants by the curb. There were still green tomatoes attached!

Yankees. Don't even know about fried green tomatoes.

I looked at my phone, saw that I still had a minute or two before the bus arrived, and got to work. I picked about two dozen tomatoes off the plants and put them in my gym bag. Then I hauled the now-heavy bag to work.

In the afternoon, on my way home, I saw that the plants were still there, so I collected even more of the tomatoes. Got home and had about 15 pounds of green tomatoes.

Primo loves fried green tomatoes, but even 15 pounds might be a bit much.

So I started googling for green tomato recipes.

Did you know you can make pie from green tomatoes? I did not. I had never heard of it. But the reviews were good on multiple sites, including Paula Deen's. What's not to like about someone who uses butter with the abandon that she does?

I made the pie. It turned out great with a great crust because I know how to make good pie crust. (The secret is lard.)

Then I thought, "I should take some pie to the people who threw away the tomatoes so they will know what a great person I am and they will be embarrassed that they wasted."

Tonight, on our way to the restaurant to use the groupon that was about to expire, Primo and I stopped at the house. I have never met these people. They probably wondered what was going on when the doorbell rang at 7:30 on a Friday.

But the woman answered the door.

"I hope this doesn't sound stalkerish," I said, "but I wanted to give you a piece of the pie I made with the tomatoes I got from the plants you had at the curb." I held out the aluminum container that I had saved from restaurant leftovers. Washed, of course.

She looked skeptical, but then I said that I lived down the street and walked past their house on my way to the bus stop every morning.

Meanwhile, Primo was rooting about in the car. I saw him out of the corner of my eye.

She laughed. "We have so many tomatoes still! We picked a ton of them before we pulled the plants. I have no idea what we're going to do with them." She took the pie.

OK. Not food wasters after all.

Primo walked up behind me. "Hi," he said to the woman. "My name is Primo and I'm running for the state house." He handed her a flyer.

I rolled my eyes. "Primo! We're talking about tomatoes!"

"I know," he said, "but I just wanted to introduce myself."

She laughed again, shook his hand, thanked us for the pie.

"Let's go," I said as I grabbed his arm. He is becoming comfortable with this politician stuff.

She thanked us again and we said goodnight. Maybe he does have a chance to win this thing.