'Tis the Season

 Here we are, Early December (the 6th, of 2021) and I'm feeling, I dunno, procrastinative (if that wasn't a word, it is now. I just adverbed a verb. and verbed adverb. Nothing like grammatical gymnastics to get the mind juices flowing).  It's a cool, but not cold, day. It's cloudy but not raining (yet). I'm up, but not productive. The dog is staring through the front door window, sucking in his cheeks and wanting to be fed. I'm sitting on the couch, alternating between looking at the dog, whining about wanting to sit in the hot tub yet doing nothing to facilitate that, pondering which leftover to eat for lunch, and wondering if I will finish one or two of about 297 projects waiting in the sewing room. They're mostly short little ones and if I got a few knocked out at least something productive will have been accomplished. 

The most likely scenario for the day will be couched in optimistic words like "planning" and "research" and "design work" but from the outside looking in, will look more like "sitting on the couch with the TV on low and occasionally getting up for a beverage".

With the exception of the sewing room and, to a lesser degree, Capt's office, the house is pretty much in good order. Friends were here for a couple of days and a Panic Cleaning 3 hours before they arrived means things are put away and surfaces are clean. God invented doors so we'd have a place to shove shit out of view, but I have been (somewhat) diligently been trying (in my own limited way) to put some sense of order to the place. I'm still struggling with the trials of combining 2 large households into one small one, and my inherent sense of "don't get rid of anything that might be useful one day, even if I know I'll probably never use it" causes useful-yet-not containers and jars and boxes to accumulate, then the psychological pain of throwing them away happens and causes double mental quandaries. 

Just the other day Kroger had pineapples for 50 cents (about to be too ripe) so I bought 4 with the intention of making some delicious pineapple jam. I have jars, Sure-Jell, sugar, all the things, and...plenty enough other things to do that I do NOT need to be making jam, especially since WE DON'T EAT JAM. And yet, soon (possibly even today) I shall prepare and can 10 (approximately) pints of jam. CHRISTMAS GIFTS! You say! Yes. right there with the 20 pints of berry jam, 4 gallons of assorted jalapeno preparations, not to mention the shipping costs of heavy glass jars containing sticky stuff upon which the post office and UPS frown. Clearly I didn't think this through very well. Oh! I know! I'll make 1/2 the pineapples into jams and the other half into dehydrated! I love dehydrated pineapple! Problem solved.

Speaking of Christmas gifts, that reminds me I need to box up stuff for an assortment of relatives and get them mailed off. Goodness knows I have boxes and I've saved all the bubble wrap from a year's worth of online shopping. (refer to previous statement about saving stuff that might be useful) I'm recycling, which is Virtuous and Cost Effective.

So yeah. Christmas Spirit is off to a sputtering start, like a lawnmower that hasn't been cranked in 9 months. The cat approved of the decorated tree, the intended gifts have accumulated on the back porch along with the boxes and all those square plastic nut containers that make amazing storage for the RV (and give Mom something to save for me). Also jars both purchased and acquired (also from Mom), and liquor bottles that are pretty enough to put honey in, should we ever get around to harvesting it from the beehive. I promise you, every time I save a thing it's because I KNOW it's going to be eventually useful. In the back of my head I also know one day my sons, who by virtue of being men, will not be interested in going through my shit after I die and will probably just sell the house fully loaded to the highest bidder. 

Also, I realize this post is a little bit rambling, but it's one of those days where everything in my body is hurting and I just want to sit here and wish the hot tub would come to me instead of me having to heave myself off the couch and walk the 10 yards outside to get to it. I know that sitting in it, amongst the blooming hibiscus and steam, will be restorative and gift me with a few hours of pain relief and productivity (possibly even involving pineapples and sugar). There. I talked myself into it. Y'all have a good day. 

Post Thanksgiving Pre Christmas or something

 Alright, Thanksgiving has been done. Several days of time spent with Capt's family and some friends, and a lot of food. I am hoping, for her sake, his mother decides to pass the tradition on to someone else. She works hard and deserves, at her age, to not do it. Not that I don't appreciate it, she's a lovely woman and does a phenomenal job, but....it's time to let someone else do it. Capt, possibly, fried his last turkeys and will be, hopefully, be passing those responsibilities on to a younger person.  If he's relieved of the turkey job then we may do our own thing elsewhere for Thanksgiving. 

So now it's on to Christmas.  I dug out a couple of red sweaters that need to be washed and dried to get 11 months of packed-away wrinkles out, and with a couple of red plaid skirts and some boots, will serve as a panoply of Holiday Accoutrement. Recently I acquired a nice women's fedora, and perhaps something festive will go on that as well. Who knows. All this is mood-dependent.

As for household decor, also mood-dependent. A long long time ago, when household income was fairly tight, I had the idea that our young children could pick out a mug, one of those shaped like a Santa Claus head, to give me as a Christmas gift. Those mugs are cheerful, ubiquitous, and just the sort of thing a young child would choose for a parent. It became an annual thing and now I've got a collection of about 40 of them, ranging from Dollar Tree finds to vintage ones from Ebay, to a couple of super fancy Fitz and Floyd offerings. All are precious to me because of the meaning behind them. They get scattered throughout the house, and with the exception of the very old ones, are available for hot chocolate or coffee to whomever wants to use one. If one gets broken, it gets glued back together and relegated to the top of the bathroom cabinets, or for use holding measuring spoons. 

Capt, having been in the wood products industry for many years, prefers not to use a live tree, so we have a pretty good fake one that may or may not see the light of day. Between the 2 of us we have some cute ocean and travel themed ornaments, all with memories attached from assorted travels. When the kids were all gone, and it was just me, I retired all the ornaments from the years past. Eventually when they have their own families, I will let them go through and choose what they want, and the rest will go back into storage for descendants to find and use. Starting over with a new life also means starting over with a new Christmas tree, and new traditions. I don't mind, it feels like the right thing to do.

Our house is set way back off the road, and no one sees it but us. Because of this, I don't mess with lights on the roof or garlands on the porch rails. I suppose if we traveled during the holiday, and had the camper parked somewhere public like an RV park, I'd decorate in a fun way, but we haven't done that thus far. Maybe one day. Not today.

One of the ways I handle the whole gift-thing is to make stuff. We have 3 grandkids who are young enough to still get a big kick out of opening gifts on Christmas morning, so they'll get something, but everyone else is going to get a box of handmade yummies that I've been working on since July. A few boxes of Mason jars, and a lot of work in front of a stove or a dehydrator has resulted in a bunch of goodies to load into boxes and deliver to people who can get their own sweaters and socks if they need them. I have no expectations of anything more than a hug and a phone call, and perhaps a tasty meal fixed by Capt. Hopefully involving something beefy.

Anyway, that's all I've got to say about that right now.

Thanksgiving cometh

 I realize there is a Movement in this country to eliminate Thanksgiving. Apparently it is indicative of the White Man's take-over of this country, stealing it from the indigenous folk who were here first. Ok, I can kind of see that. However, as a solidly white person with a dribble of Native American from a multi-great grandmother who had a relationship with a white man, I embrace Thanksgiving. There were a bunch of white folks who were helped out by a bunch of Natives way back in the day, and Thanksgiving is a recognition of that, and has morphed into the current incarnation, where we give thanks for what we have...whatever that may be.

As for me, I have much for which to be thankful this year. Some I won't go into, some I will. 

Without giving details that aren't mine to give, I am thankful for the way situations have worked out with family members. Stuff was bad, now it's not. Healing seems to be happening in certain arenas. For that, I am thankful. I say seems...because I can only go by what I see and while I know sometimes (often times) things aren't exactly what they look like on the surface, currently I am giving thanks for what I see. Every morning. 

The first thing I do upon waking up is to thank God that I woke up, and that I didn't get a middle-of-the-night phone call from a hospital, saying I needed to get there immediately because of some dire circumstance involving one of my family members. Then I go down the list of people I love, and give thanks for the improved circumstances in their lives. I figure a good way to start the day is to give thanks, rather than ask for stuff.  

I guess in that way, every day is Thanksgiving. Every day is Easter as well....giving thanks for Christ's resurrection and all that means. 

Then there's the...sort of...Day of Thanksgiving. You know, that last Thursday in November where people eat too much and maybe get up with their cousins or something. One of the delightful parts of being with Capt's family is that Thanksgiving is a Big Deal. It's not just one day. Oh no. It gets stretched out into 4 days of gluttony, excess, and hooting about football. People start coming in on Wednesday, so there's a giant Low Country Boil (look it up) and Cousin Drew brings a sack of oysters as well. Then Thursday everyone meets at a different house and eats too much. Capt fries turkeys and everyone else brings everything else and there's food enough for 1000 even though usually there's 40-50 including screaming children and Aunt Ann who's a lovely person but can't remember anything, nonetheless is as gracious and wonderful as an Old South Matriarch could possibly be.  I am particularly charmed and grateful that they accept and welcome my children even though we're new to the mix. 

On Friday, people lay around and groan and eat leftovers, gearing up and recovering to get ready for Saturday. That's the day of The Iron Bowl...the biggest and fiercest rivalry in the entire country. Auburn versus Alabama. This year it's being played in Auburn. There are 2 of us who went to Auburn, the rest are Alabama alumni and there's some bit of the Alabama School of Business with a family name attached so the loyalty is absolute. The party starts early, and there's a plurality of TVs showing every angle and announcer, a beer fridge, snacks for 100, and Capt's father graciously put an Auburn magnet on his Alabama beer fridge.

True story: I met Capt's family for the first time Thanksgiving 2017. Now, generally is it expected Alabama will win. They're like that. As for Auburn, I am always surprised with they win anything. Well. That year, Auburn beat Alabama at the Iron Bowl. And I was sitting there, surrounded by dedicated Alabama people, the lone Auburn person in my orange shirt, sucking it in so hard because I'd just met these people and wanted to make a good impression. Capt was begging me to not gloat, and I was closing my watering eyes, trying so hard. Hopefully I managed to be calm about it. I know that his parents (father especially) took it hard but he was gracious. I told him I was sorry his team had lost, because it meant ever so much more to him than it did to me.  

Anyway, the whole point of this is that, Thanksgiving is a big deal, probably the biggest deal of the year. Christmas isn't much anymore. The kids are grown and off elsewhere. Even though I've spent the last 2 months prepping gifts for them, there won't be much in the way of festivities or decorations happening. With no youngun's I don't see the point. There's a few grandkids, but only one is local and his other set of grandparents do Christmas so over-the-top I figure that covers what we don't go.

It really is my favorite holiday, and has been for many, many years. Even when there were kids at home and Christmas meant something. I've preferred Thanksgiving since...I don't know...the late 1980's. There's no obligations to be fancy( Easter or Halloween) or give presents (Easter or Christmas) or blow stuff up (like Independence Day). It's just...food, and gratitude. I have so very much to be grateful for and while I try to keep that in mind every day, the once-a-year mandated reminder kicks it into high gear, and I get to eat fried turkey, pineapple casserole, and lady peas. 

And I am so very thankful for those things, as well as the roof over my head, the freedom to gripe about my government, fresh water, and that my kids are all provided for. Those are all things that should never be taken for granted.

Plans!

 Winter Approcheth. Winter in the Deep South is more of a concept than a reality. Around here it means dreary days of rain with the occasional complete shut-down inducing flakes of snow followed by black ice on bridges. Anyone remember Snowmageddon that closed Atlanta for several days and caused Chik-Fil-A to deliver sandwiches to stranded motorists on I-285? I remember it. I wasn't living in Atlanta so I just shrugged and made soup.

Anyway, Capt and I make Winter Escaping Plans. Last year we went to South Fla in the Pompano Beach area for a dive trip. That was fun! The year before we went to Key West and I got my first real life exposure to drag queens and snow crab claws. Also Fun!  Capt's making noises now about another trip down to the Keys, for a couple of days of diving and boating (we're going to take The Other Line along), then drive to Tampa to spend a couple days with friends there. I want to hit up the Goodwill store in Naples because c'mon....Naples. You KNOW the Goodwill has to be something special. It's the first place I ever saw 4 McLarens at a stoplight. And some sort of supercar we couldn't identify but later determined it was a Volvo. I didn't know Volvo even made a supercar but there it was.  We ate at a restaurant that had Martini and Mussel Monday (I think it was Monday....might have been Wednesday) and I got the BEST mussels I'd ever had *AND* a proper martini. There were lots of fancy Ladies Who Lunch there and the whole thing was some sort of cultural experience that made me smile.

So yeah, we're making Winter Plans again. Nothing's firm, and initially I was kind of "hmmm" about it but then I remembered the Keys have John Pennecamp State Park and I have dive gear including tanks we could get filled somewhere and Pennecamp is some of the best diving in the country so there's that.  Plus the boat and Capt's kind of grooving on the idea of boating around the Keys and possibly catching a fish. Our friends in Tampa have ample room and a private dock, and Capt would love to explore the flats in the area and maybe do some more fishing. 

The more I think about it, the more I'm loving the idea of it. There's something about getting away to a Tropical Locale in the middle of Winter (or what passes for it in Central Alabama) for a complete change of venue that is deeply appealing. 

I'd have to probably shave my legs. 

And do a couple of practice dives maybe in a Florida spring, just to make sure I remember how. If he's teaching a class at the University around then, I could go into the pool and fritz around. Just to be sure.

Anyway, it's a possibility. For now we're going to do some fishing expeditions in the North Florida flats around Apalachicola and Port Saint Joe because it's that time of year and redfish is delicious.

Where has the time gone?

 Geez it's been a couple of months. What can I say? I've been busy, y'all.  Doing what? What on Earth could a 56 year old fairly recently remarried window mother of 4 grown kids POSSIBLY be busy doing? I mean seriously. I'm not even formally employed. Or apparently employable. A couple of years ago I threw my new resume out there into the proverbial wind. I got a few nibbles to which I enthusiastically responded but my enthusiasm was met with (what seemed to be) Oh. You're Old. I wanted to put on my resume', down at the bottom, something along the lines of "As a 56 year old woman, I will not be called by the schools to fetch sick children. I will not spend the day crying because my boyfriend didn't call yesterday. I will not be out 3 days a month due to menstrual cramps. I make excellent coffee and am not too highly educated to do it." But no. I'm 56. I have grey hair and occasionally swollen ankles. I am not a pretty piece of boobage to ornament the front desk and flirt with the clients. Never mind I can make them feel like their mother just gave them a hug and offer them the best coffee they'd had in a month.

Frustrated much? Naw. Not in the least. Nor is my ego damaged because of it. Their loss, not mine.

Which is slightly a lie. No one likes to be rejected. 

So what HAVE I been doing? Well, The Boat came in. A fine piece of flats-floating work Capt named The Other Line (as in "Can't come to the phone right now, he's on The Other Line"  get it? Huh? Get it? Haw!) So work has been proceeding on getting it fully equipped with all the ancillary stuff like tackle, EPIRB, life jackets, things, the Coast Guard insists on. Also figuring out the best places to fish. Other business stuff like cards, magnet things to go on the truck, getting a website (site has been bought but not yet established)...you know...the stuff of today's business environment. 

Also...a lot of embroidery work...sort of.

And some reading, writing, cooking, gardening, general figuring out of "where do we want to go from here?" Capt's office is getting arranged. The desk needs sorting out and there's some boxes of stuff that don't have a home yet. 

I'm trying to figure out my dog. Bless him. He refuses to let us know when he has to poop so we find it in assorted places in the house and that has resulted in a banishment to the outside. I hate that, but one can't have one's members of the household making deposits of the non-financial sort on the floor. The cat, on the other hand, is very smug about it all. 

Food continues to be a source of stress. Capt has so little he can eat these days without upsetting his system in one way or another. For a person who's a committed foodie, that's more than just an inconvenience. It's having one of your favorite sources of pleasure removed, but knowing it's still there mocks you. Going to the grocery store used to be fun, now it's a minefield and very discouraging. He tells me I don't need to restrict my diet just because of him, but I'm not going to sit down and eat a giant Reuben in front of him, or a pizza, or any other thing he used to love but now can't eat for fear it will make him sick. How rude would that be?  

Today? I'm trying to ignore the news. With a vodka cranberry. 

Sometimes you just need a cookie.

 What's your favorite cookie? I like oatmeal raisin. Those are my comfort cookie. I like them made with real butter, and I spice them up a bit with cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice. Nothing fancy recipe-wise, just the one on the back of the oatmeal box. Add raisins and chopped pecans or walnuts. I have nothing against other cookies. Chocolate chips are good, snickerdoodles are even better, and good ol' 3 ingredient shortbreads are even better than oatmeal raisin but I don't make them often because I'll seriously eat the entire pan because...y'know...butter, flour, and sugar. You can't get more elemental than that.

When I was growing up, my Mom made spectacular piecrust, like really REALLY good that would bake up crisp and flaky. She would cut off the trimmings and bake them with cinnamon and sugar on them. She called the piecrust cookies and they never lasted long enough to even cool off properly. I have been know, occasionally, to make piecrust without the pie, tear it into pieces and sprinkle it with cinnamon sugar, just to have the childhood memory of Mom making a pie and the added treat of the cookies.

I truly don't know what my kids favorite cookies were. They would eat anything. I know one of them always asks for a German chocolate cake, but the others never (to my recollection) had a particular preference. My late husband always wanted peanut butter cookies and Capt likes chocolate chip with pecans. 

Now, it's 2 of us here with an occasional Grandpunkin and #3 dropping by. When I make cookies now, I don't bake the entire batch and have 5024 cookies on a plate goading us into eating them all in one day. I will make a whole batch of dough, use my tiny ice cream scoop (about 1-1/2 inch diameter) and scoop balls onto a tray to freeze. Then they go into a ziploc bag in the freezer, and when one of us wants cookies, a few balls go onto a baking sheet and we have some cookies without having a gluttonous frenzy. I can throw a few balls into a container and send home with #3 to share with Grandpunkin, or take some to Mom to have with her afternoon tea. She also loves oatmeal raising and Dad likes chocolate chip.

I'm not going to take the time to write out the recipes because they're just the ones off the chocolate chip bag and the oatmeal box. The only differences are these:

• I always ALWAYS use real butter.
• I use all brown sugar, or turbinado sugar, instead of 1/2 brown and 1/2 white
• With oatmeal, I add 1/2 teaspoon each ground cinnamon and allspice, and 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg. I know nutmeg isn't everyone's cup of tea so leave it out if you aren't a fan. You can also use 2 teaspoons of pumpkin pie or apple pie spice blend
• Occasionally I've made Kitchen Sink cookies. Those are oatmeal cookies with ALL the good stuff added: chocolate chips, nuts, raisins, dried cranberries, coconut, anything you can think of. About 1/4 cup of at least 4 things.
• When mixing the butter, eggs, and vanilla, I whip it in a stand mixer for several minutes until it's so creamed together it's almost white.

There. That's my cookie post.

"CRS is highly permanent right now"

 There's all kinds of theories about memories, loss, recall, all that stuff...whether they're gone, or it's recall that's a problem.  Or (my favorite Highly Unscientific But Far More Palatable) that your brain gets full and when a new memory comes in an older one gets shoved out...usually during the night and that's what the wet stuff is on your pillow. Old memories, not drool. Of course, that doesn't explain the memory issues of walking into a room and not remembering why....only that you've got a plausible reason for doing so.

Do you ever make a reason up, just to keep from embarrassing yourself? Even if no one is around and you're the only one disturbed by situation. I do that sometimes. I'll go into the storage room to get something, and have no idea why, so I'll grab some toilet paper or ziploc bags and go back in the house. Then I'll remember it was mason jars...but was it quart or pint? Then I have to parse *that* out. Am I canning beans or pickling jalapenos or making marmalade? Oh right....marmalade. 1/2 pints. And I'm out of them so I go online to see who has them nearby and wouldn't you know Tractor Supply has Wrangler jeans on sale! I need to call (whoever) and let them know! Why was I at Tractor Supply? I don't want need any horsefeed or bearings or giant bags of candy orange slices. Oh well, I guess I'll go read a while.

4 hours later....

darnit I needed 1/2 pints.

Even Capt, who's memory is usually exceptional, has his moments. I think like me, his mind works in overdrive but he's better at keeping things compartmentalized so the mental colors don't run together. A couple of days ago when I was expressing so much frustration as being an airhead, he gently said "you're not an airhead, your mind is just always 3 steps ahead and you lose track." Maybe. But it's personally embarrassing to forget I need 1/2 pint jars and get toilet paper instead. Even if bringing it in the house served a practical purpose.

Then there's that perpetual Mother of Several situation of calling your kids by the wrong names. I do it every. single. time. Almost. It helps if there's only one here and I can tell myself silently "his name is (X) his name is (X) his name is (X)" but that's still no guarantee. "his name is (X)" in my head and "HEY (Y)! Great to see you!" "Hi Mom, I'm X.." Oh. I knew that. hi anyway, its still great to see you.

There's one area where I'm guaran-damn-teed not to forget. Never will I ever, because my brain at 2 am will call all this up and beat me about the head and neck with it. It's all the everything I have ever done really wrong. The time I inadvertently offended someone in the 7th grade. She'd gotten new glasses and I said something rude. Then there was the time....and the other time...and that one time...Shut up brain. Why won't you remember 1/2 pint jars instead?

The statement there on the title comes from Capt. He said that earlier today. "What's CRS?" I asked.

"Can't Remember Shit."  

Oh...he said that right after he asked what I fixed for lunch and I replied with "same thing I fixed 10 minutes ago when you asked." But then right now he's not firing on all cylinders, through no fault of his own. Soon he'll be back to his normal self.