Thank you NaBloPoMo

I’m feeling unwell today. The queen of worst case scenarios says e coli but logical brain says not. We’ll see what tomorrow brings. December already!

I have enjoyed my month of daily posting. Whether or not I keep it up is another story, but it's been fun.  See ya around.

Signs of Xmas

It's after TG. It's allowed now!

Found this on a rare WalMart visit. $6.92! Such an odd amount.

This shirt too!

I channeled my inner Grinch for the book store's window.

This looks pretty festive. Unfortunately, the red tortilla was stale.

You Expect Me to Eat That?

I don't think any words are necessary here.

Which?

Too many junky emails lead me to places I don't need to go.

Do I need these?

Or these?

They're both me. Alas, I think I have enough cute socks. I have really moved on from the days when I wore the kids hand me downs.

Here are today's selection.

Calamari

I bought some frozen calamari with the intent of recreating this recipe from a favorite local restaurant.



Frank took up the gauntlet for me. After organizing the parts to my new food processor (oh now there's a saga for another time) he pureed the cheesy filling and stuffed the little buggers.

We felt concern for whoever preps these in the restaurant, but they probably have a better skill set than we do.

Oh they were delicious.

The Stubbening

It's happened again. Is this going to be an annual event? I'm going to call it the Stubbening.

Yes, I whacked the same little toe, not on the hearth this time, but on the coffee table.

We Took It Easy

It was a low key holiday. Most of the crew lay around.

I purchased small pies from the farmer's market, so that eased up the cooking considerably.

I did get out the traditional turkey platter.

Ok this is as minimal as I could get.

We didn't bake the rolls, so they made lunch the next day.

Yesterday Morning

3am feed cat
6am feed all the cats
8am feed cat
9am refuse to feed cat
make coffee
load dishwasher
wash more dishes
empty fridge of leftovers
refuse to wash more dishes
finally pour coffee
look at house
look at mess in house
ignore said mess
uncover computer (it rained last night and there's often a drip over the computer, so I proactively covered it with towels last night)
fold towels and put away
sit down but forget to bring coffee
look at a few things and start this post
give up and go get coffee

Thanksgiving Greetings

Wishing you all a happy Thanksgiving from us, humans and cats alike. And the wild turkeys who roam the neighborhood.

Working on my EOY reccs

Around the holidays, we bookstore staffers are asked to recommend some of our favorite books. So I'm thinking back over the year. Thank goodness for Goodreads because I couldn't remember otherwise. I'd be, I know I read it but when?

These are two recent favorites I highly recommend!

The Chappening

It’s really hard to take a selfie of your two index finger tips. This seems to be the time of year when my fingers eat themselves. I might have started with a small knife knick on one, but they turned into two gaping holes plus a lot of chappyness. My coworkers were somewhat horrified as I apparently* smeared a streak of blood on an inventory sheet. Oh no. 

*I swear I didn’t notice this happening. Circumstantial evidence. Whodunnit? Could have been raspberry sauce! I found some of that on a chair outside! Need an amateur CSI here. 

My piano teacher knows the chappening happened to me last year too. 

Ok so a couple days band-aided with neosporin. Then healing hands salve, and glovie wovies when doing nasty kitchen stuff. They are much better now, but it looks to be a long crappy I mean chappy  winter. 

One of Those Nights

I was very sad to not be sleeping at 4:30 one night morning. Fifi had gotten me up extra early with the lying starving cat meow, and I just could not get back to sleep. I tried relaxation exercises, I tried visualization, I tried breathing techniques, I tried counting cats sheep. Well, I exaggerate but you get it...

I resorted to lullabies.

Public Service Announcement:  Baby Nightmare Before Christmas JUST DOES NOT WORK!

Life of the Crazy Cat Lady

I think this says it all...

(I don't have living parents, so we can scratch that one.)

I do have a life, although you wouldn't know it from all these cat posts. Four cats can be a little consuming. Yes, I was crazy. We lost my darling Homer last fall. We would have been fine, just fine, with Fifi and Hunter. And yet, there was that insatiable desire for an orange kitty. And the hunt was so difficult. Each time we thought we had located a potential adoptee, it was snatched away to another loving home before we could get there. Finally we got a lead on a whole clowder of orange creamsicles... Leo and Harry stole our hearts and I do not regret it one bit! But it does tend to make me look a bit crazy.

I don't care. Even though the litterbox bag is actually THAT BIG!

My Open House Baking Ordeals

Every year the book store staffers make goodies for the store's holiday open house. The catch? The recipe must be from a cookbook currently sold at the store.

My first year, I overreached and everything that could go wrong, did. Here's The Saga of Romeo's Sighs and Juliet's Kisses. I have noted since then that a lot of the staff "test" their recipes beforehand, and often change their minds. OK, highlight that one on my iPhone mental "how to succeed at your job checklist." What, you don't have one of those? I write down how to deal with all the weird rare occurrences, and then when I handle them I look like a star. Whoops, 30 year secret exposed: take notes and cover your ass!

The second year went much better. From my Facebook: "I know, cookies are tiny tidbits in the grand scheme of life. Yet, when one is asked to bake an unfamiliar recipe for the store's Holiday Open House, one is delighted when they approach perfection. These are picturesquely entitled Apples Rolled in Autumn. In truth, an oatmeal-apple-walnut cookie."

The third year, I tried something cutesy. Dorothy's Toast from The Wizard's Cookbook.

I don't have a picture because it ended up not looking at all like the picture in the cookbook. It tasted OK, though. (I really wanted to do the Wizard's Wands. Maybe if I have a party someday...)

This year I went with Chrissy Teigen's Twitter's Banana Bread and I do feel this was a complete success. There are coconut flakes and chocolate chunks in that beauty, along with six (yes 6) bananas. And it came perfectly out of the pan, which is a win right there!

Available today (11/17/18) for a limited time only!

Limelight

We had some mint left in the fridge. Mojitos? asked Frank. Mojitos, said I.

Ah.

Handy liked them so much he wanted to make another batch. He kept asking me what to do. I don't know, I'm busy cooking right now. I just printed the recipe and Frank made them (the joys of having an over-21 child who can bartend for you). Why don't you look at the recipe, honey. Finally when he was going to put the club soda in the shaker, I just exploded, like I knew the shaker would do if he shook it with club soda in it! Look at the recipe NOW dammit please. (I said please but you know what I really meant.) So he did and they were fine.

With all those limes in the house, I had to make something limey for dinner. This is from Chrissy Teigen's Cravings: Hungry For More cookbook.

I didn't have skinny carrots so the old fat ones had to do. And I did reduce the cayenne by about half because I like to not burn my throat. We all agreed this was really delicious and it will go in the regular dinner repertoire.

So was it possible for me to do a post without cats Yes. But where's the fun? So here's Lime-Cat.

Although its probably a pomelo.

Meowing Like She'd Never Been Fed

This is my life with Fifi.

She was meowing so loudly after only a 2 hour interval. I really needed to sleep a little longer, I thought, but she had other ideas. So I got up, got some food out for her, and then noticed this little CATastrophe:

The boys were beating up a bird. There were feathers all over the room. Frankly, I was pissed I had to deal with this. It's an ongoing issue between me and Handy. They need to go outside, he says. They do not, I say. So far he has won with Hunter, and I have won with the younger set. I would like to go on strike over having to clean up the results of a cat going outside. But if I had left it, there would have been feathers over the entire house, not just the room. Aaargh.

Anyway, I'd like to thank Fifi for tattling to me about the boys, and I promised her I’d react better to the meows in the future since they are not always (just mostly) about food.

But now, a couple days later she is once again meowing after 2 hours and I just don’t want to get up!?

After the Last Tuition Bill is Paid...

Finally something non-cat related.

It’s 4 years since we sent Ernest off to college. He’s in a five year program but skipped one co-op so he will finish in 4.5. I paid the last tuition bill for his final (fall) semester and boy does that make me happy.

So now I can get on the deferred maintenance for the house.

Paint for sure.



Landscaping, since there's nothing left in the yard since the last tree disaster.



Roofing? Yeah, there's not much left of the 1968 addition shingles.  We replaced the 1963 portion in the 90's but that is showing some wear, too.

Oh, the broken garage window.  That's only been about 7 years.



Handy Husband has decided he's not handy any more. I can't blame him for being tired of it all. But that means I have to find someone to do it. I keep thinking I could paint most of the house myself. But...but...but it's a huge job. I'd never finish.

We decided we'd start at the top down so Handy has been delegated to find a roofer.

#1 Lunch

There was a new burger in town which we tried a couple months ago, and it was good. But it was rapidly dethroned.



The new #1 burger is at The Hitching Post's new tasting room. It is fine and divine.

We've been there a few times. This time I tried something different, although Handy and Frank stuck to the burgers.

Steak and grilled onions. Yum!

Frank ordered a grilled artichoke, too.

Feline Security

So I mentioned the meowderer in the house. Francine is the crotchety old lady, the household manipulator manager.

She also likes a hobbitish number of meals a day. Perhaps even more than this:

I stocked the cupboard on the last trip to the store. Will this safisfy her?

No, she says. We only have 1/2 container of treats (not pictured). She is concerned.

OK. She's better now.

15 is the minimum

Oh no! I think that's only 30.  I really wanted to beat Brian so I scrounged around some more.

It's hard to tell but I think I ended up with 38.

Nyah nyah nyah.

Overachiever.

Crisis at the Cafe!

Omg omg Harry just destructed the cafe for no reason! Except cat reason, which must have some logical basis that only cats understand. 

Big brother Hunter, or the Skipper to Harry’s Gilligan, expresses some concern.

"Little Buddy, this is why we can't have nice things!"

Handy stapled the thing back together. I wonder what the next cafe event will be?