What's happening in this window?

 Today's Advent Calendar window is a puzzle: what's the robin sitting on, in his earnest conversation with Santa? And is he giving his wishlist or hoping for a sleigh ride?

How a dead battery caused chocolate bark

 When my neighbor moved my car for the snowplow, he commented when he brought back the keys that it was a hard start.  I thought probably because I hadn't driven it in a couple of days, and the very cold nights didn't help.  However, having had 20 years of driving a Honda Civic which literally never failed to start, ever, I had no experience in this issue. Then this morning I thought I'd just pop out and run the car for a few minutes to keep the battery working, too icy to drive about.  And found it was dead as a doornail. Oh.  

Appealed to the neighbors, since the other option was a two or more hour wait for AAA. And neighbor J. said, no, no, don't bother, I'll fix it.  Just lift the lid, I mean the hood.  Which I did, having found out how to do that, never did it before up to now.  Managed that, and she came out with a gadget I'd never heard of but now need, a portable battery jumper.  No need to use a second vehicle, I've been living in the dark ages.  She attached it, started the car in about two seconds, and said you don't drive this enough.  You need to do that.  Quite right.  I let it run for a few minutes, then did a little trip around the development before bringing it back.

Other neighbor says he agrees with me I need to have one of these clever things, and he will get hold of one for me, since he knows all about them, and I'm baffled by the hundreds of models and sizes and specs.  

So, since I'd hauled them out on a freezing Saturday when they'd probably just as soon not, and they were very obliging, as always, I thought, this is a destination for that bark I still haven't made.  So I added it to the agenda for the afternoon.

 

Two layers, dark then white, and I swirled it about with the spatula to make interesting shapes. You'll notice this is rather a small amount of bark, compared to the acres I made last time.  They seem to be putting fewer chocolate chips in those bags, or something. At least they seem to decrease as they sit in the fridge.  It's a mystery.

 And, after I'd had a good time hitting the bark to break it up, it joined the baked goods, which I decided would be blueberry hot biscuits.

Speaking of food happening, I put the feeder I used to have on the patio, which was now in the way of the forthcoming fence, out front.  I moved it once because birds didn't come, and I thought it was too near the window.  Birds didn't come.  I put a lot more plants on the kitchen windowsill, so as to give them a sense of not being overlooked. Birds didn't come.  Last night because it was very cold, I closed the kitchen curtains.

 A Carolina wren scouted the joint, didn't eat, but evidently went to put out the word, because today a little bunch of juncoes, then a couple of finches, showed up and have evidently accepted that this top of the line suet block is in fact food.  It's exactly the same food they've been getting here for years.  Then later the wren showed up back on the patio, and was evidently searching for the food in the "right" place. 

Mystery bird

 If anyone can identify this flying figure, please do. It might be a European robin, can't say I've ever seen one in flight. I'm learning that I don't have to know everything, so I'm not researching this one.  If I find out, good, but not by dint of searching.

I was reading an essay today about Christmas and being free not to do things the way we always have.  Partly it's about the pandemic, partly about the idea that it's okay to do things the way that suits us, rather than the socially demanded way.  All year round, that is.

One of the immediate subjects is, for people who celebrate Christmas, that if you simply decide to be simple, it gives other people permission to do likewise.  Which had not occurred to me, even though when I see other people being casual and comfortable and not stressing out about their hair and eyebrows and Christmas cards and so on, it gives me permission to do likewise.  Not that my hair and eyebrows are ever a concern, to be honest, but for some people that kind of grooming issue has been a big deal during lockdown.

So I hereby put my money where my mouth is, and say: I will greet people with texts and emails as I get to it, and definitely in response to their greeting me. No flock of cards is going out. The little decorations I have out at home will not be added to.  

Christmas dinner is being brought by Handsome Son, heat and eat style,just as we did at Thanksgiving.  I'll get out the red cloth and the white embroidered cloth and glasses, and lay the table.  I'll make an apple crumble for dessert.  Nothing fancier.  And I'll enjoy the day. We may even be celebrating on the 25th this year. Everyone I know has too much stuff, so it's not really a favor to give presents, unless they can be consumed right away.  So aside from getting out The Pearls, that's it for our huge festivities.  And it will be enough.

I don't believe in making Christmas the centerpiece of the year, certainly don't start planning it in January, as some folks I know do, and good luck to them, if they like it, go for it.  Me, not being swept up in that energy.

I really think learning to live in the present is a bigger deal now than ever, since we realize better than ever that we don't know how much present we're going to get. It's like the difference between 9/10 and 9/11.  We were in deadly danger on 9/10, but we didn't know it then. After 9/11 we certainly knew it, and continue to.

It's a continuing work in progress for me, learning not to make anxiety the default of the day.  But I'm working on it. So many things don't matter as much as they seem to in the middle of the night.

So that's where I am, and I do offer these thoughts to you in the hope that they might be helpful, or at least interesting, and if not, you can always scroll on quietly.

Off to make blueberry muffins now, for Handsome Son tomorrow.

Late breaking vegetables

 After I'd written the previous post, my Misfits market box arrived.

Flour and oats from the extras department, and various fruit and veg. ncluding a mango, which doesn't seem to be showing up here.  I've decided that my mid morning fruit doesn't always have to be an apple, big departure there.  It can be a kiwi fruit, or a helping of blueberries,  bit of mango, very daring.

Greens of various kinds taking a cool bath to crisp up the lettuce, revive the cilantro which it did, and wash grit off everything, broccoli, scallions, amazing how much grit you wash off this stuff.

Some of this will be my Friday night salad.  And Saturday and probably Sunday, too.

I haven't bought cilantro in ages, and, not being one of the people whose genes dictate that it tastes like soap, was interested in having a bit right now.  It will go nicely in green soups and salads, but I wondered if there were any other uses.  I love the smell of it on my fingers after I've been handling it.

So I looked up cilantro recipes.  And found a lot of them, where there were 52 ingredients, multiple processes, and a bit of cilantro sprinkled on top at the end.  Which reminded me of the recipe I found in Wisconsin in the early 60s, for Beef Curry.  Now, a true Brit, I'd basically lived on Indian food for years at the uni, and the spices were just fine, which pleases my Indian neighbors who, when they want to share food, ask a bit anxiously if I can do spices. So I thought Beef Curry would be good, since I'd got to be a dab hand at chicken curry before we emigrated, and I was now in the land where there was excellent beef.

And found that it was basically a beef stew with one pinch of curry powder added in at the end. Which is no more a curry than my Auntie Mary, mythical lady, is a movie star.  Perfectly nice beef stew (this was back when I ate beef before going off it) but not a curry by any stretch.

However, this was in the days when salt and pepper were  the staple condiments and the sort of mild mustard you got on hot dogs was considered pushing out the boat a bit.  It was also the bad old days where a salad could consist of various veggie-adjacent items in green jello.  Over which we will draw a veil.

So there will soon be soup and various ways of eating veggies, and I think I will finally make those flour tortillas with the authentic flour courtesy of Chris, and stuff them with cheese and salad things, and who knows what else may occur to me. And I'll call them Cilantro Tortillas. You'll get the blow by blow as I do it, unless you get lucky. And there will be blueberry muffins. And possibly an apple crumble, those being Granny Smiths. And now that I have enough flour, maybe even bread will happen.

Speaking of shopping adventures, I try to hold down how much I ask Handsome Son to pick up for me at the store, so I thought I'd order a bunch of boxes of tissues online.  And got the usual confirmation, and expected date of arrival.  Then a later one.  Then a later one.  Then, sorry, it's running behind. Then it will be there tomorrow.  Then today. Then, sorry, it's lost, please click here to process a refund unless you want a replacement.  Since they hadn't done so well with the first try I clicked for a refund rather than wait all over again for a replacement.  That was yesterday.  Today the carton arrived.  Who knows what they'll say tomorrow.

My kitchen smells like an old fashioned produce store.  Like the greengrocer's shop I grew up with.  Or the horse drawn cart that came around the streets, big white horse, housewives used to save crusts for him. 

It's the smells that trigger memory.  Like Proust's madeleine waking up the reptilian brain.  Did you know there's a perfectly wonderful graphic novel about the first part of Proust's A La Recherche du Temps Perdu?  It's brilliant, the graphics totally getting the concepts and conveying them movingly. It's in my library. It's also in English, sorry, should have said that. I'm hoping they continue with a second volume, but it must have been very time-consuming to make the first volume, so possibly patience will be useful here.

Dog included

 Interesting that we tend to celebrate Christmas as a time of snow and frost, when the original events took place in a very different climate, where it would have been amazing to have snow everywhere. And the cozy notion of cottages far away on a hillside, too, very geography specific.  Just a thought.

Today is icy after the snow cleanup.  A layer of it lurking under the snow.  So I'm not venturing out today.  No expedition while the cleaning family are here, just staying home, out of their way, wearing a mask.  They are masked and gloved, very considerate.

Soon it will be the solstice, and soon after that we'll see the days lengthen tiny bit by tiny bit.  February in this region always seems weird to me, still very cold but with a lot more daylight to enjoy being frozen..

Oops, fell off the sled

 This morning's Advent Calendar door.

And the scene outside after the storm.  We are in that region that is always on the cusp between two systems, one side rain, one side snow.  We seem to have got the snow side this time, several inches of wet stuff, but it could have been worse, as it is north of here.

Here's the sidewalk snowblower, huffing and sticking, trying to throw heavy wet snow. The cloudy bit at the left is the snow it's managed to fire out.  They have to get this done in order for the shovelers to do the individual paths.  After the plows came last night during the night.  Which was after the sanders came last afternoon. It's an unfolding drama.

People who are mainly working from home, are not rushing out to clear their cars yet, either.  I'll wait till there's activity before I do anything. I think I can clear my car, but as for digging around it, I may need help with that.  It's not a matter of going anywhere, but of moving cars so that the plows can clear everything before it all freezes again tonight. Usually one of the neighbors takes my keys and does that for me.  No idea where my car goes, just an act of faith that it will be brought back!

My plan is to stay indoors and have soup.  And maybe make some chocolate bark before I sample all the chocolate chips and there are none left for bark.  My bite is faster than my bark.

I ran out of bread, so I was forced to make these

 But first, the Christmas tree showed up on the Advent Calendar, lit and ready to go.

 

And here are the cranberries, from Misfits, and Canadian, which seems strange to a person living in the cranberry state, but the NJ cranberries all seem to be contracted to big companies to make drinks and other cranberry adjacent products.  Anyway, these are very good.

And pancakes, which the cookbook calls crepes, which they are not, crepes being so thin as to be transparent,and these are thin, but definitely pancakes the way I like them.  I'm not a fan of the ones that look like athletic shoe soles.

And for once I did let the batter rest for an hour, and found that is a very good idea.

First layer of cranberry sauce

 Then a couple more, and a drawing of molasses on top.  Very good afternoon tea yesterday, with a pot of tea.  Celebratory.

Birthday bouquet needs its own space

 This just arrived and is posing on all sides so you can enjoy. 

Roses, tithonia, hydrangea, bird of Paradise, and more.

It's now set up where I can see it from all over. 

Thank you, D, or I, in real life! It's lovely.

Red, red robin takes a bow

The European robin, to be exact.  Which is a totally different sort of bird from the American robin.  Europeans, on being told that pigeon-like thing with the pink chest is a robin, say, never!  that's a pigeon with a pink chest.  Real robins are tiny, very bold and friendly, sit on your spade while you're gardening, or maybe on your hat.  They are winter birds, and feature on many a British Christmas card, sitting on a snowy log.

The naming confusion is all the fault of the Pilgrims, who were as good at birds and botany as they were at getting along with and appreciating native Americans.  I'm guessing they were mainly townsfolk, though I haven't researched this.  They certainly named things at random.  A bird with a pink chest might as well be called a robin.

And there's the goldfinch, the American version of which, brilliant yellow and black spring plumage, I know very well because it's the state bird of NJ.  But the goldfinch of Donna Tartt's brilliant novel of the same name, looks nothing like it.

 

Turns out that's the European, original, goldfinch.  See him, peeking out? And the European concept around the goldfinch is that it represents the soul.  Which gives a whole other meaning to that novel, which I recommend highly you read, if you haven't already.  It's not about birds, except very indirectly, it's a massive quest and adventure and all sorts of events.

You need to read it in print, not audio, though, because there are passages you whip through, so exciting, to find out what's next, and passages you linger over because they're so packed with meaning you need to address them that way.  Audiobooks have one failing, that they are read totally at the same speed throughout, destroying the dramatic impact of good writing as often as not.  But better than no access, I guess.

 Likewise the settlers',  we're back to the settlers, plant naming, it's good thing we have the Latin true names, because they really fell down on that one.

I was pretty good at botany as a kid in the UK.  It's more or less a requirement.  On Girl Guide hikes, our leader would say, name me the first ten plants we see out here on this moor.  And everyone could.  There was no what's this little green thing? or well, it's a little white flower, no, we knew our plants.  So I had to relearn a whole lot when I moved to the US.  My time in France wasn't much of a botanical education, the French people I knew having zero knowledge of, or interest in, botany.  Not much call for it in the high rent district of Paris.

But, aside from having different vegetation here, other than the plants John Tradescant stole and brought back to England for his boss, Lord Cecil, Elizabeth First's right hand man on state affairs and the treasury, which from then on we counted as English plants, such a nerve, there was a lot to learn.

The preceding paragraph, which is one sentence, is witness to a heavy Latin education, the periodic style, with subordinate clauses sticking out all over, but it makes sense if you stay with it.

One of the great blessings of not growing up with poison ivy, (now we're back to plants, I feel as if there should be a helpful voiceover in this blogpost), for instance, it being rare to nonexistent where I lived, is that you don't develop sensitivity to it until you've been exposed a few times.

So I was able to uproot and toss it at will, to the horror of my neighbors, who expected me to collapse quite soon.  And one of them refused to come into my living room until I removed a lovely vase of wild flowers and weeds, including a bunch of poison ivy, which I had thought pretty enough to pick.  She said if she even brushed against it, she'd be one big rash.

Wonderful discoveries about plants and trees, like the sassafras tree with the three kinds of leaves, very exciting stuff for me.  

My mid morning fruit break.  Looks seasonal, somehow.  The star motif gets in everywhere.

Current reading, highly recommended, is Rachel Joyce's The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. 

I heard of her yesterday for the first time, and already I'm deep into this novel. It's a quest novel, on very humble lines, with a kind of accidental pilgrim, Harold of the title, in search of connection, and learning a lot on the way.  It's very much Canterbury Pilgrims in its way of introducing interesting characters, vignette style, and their stories, except that Harold's is a lone pilgrimage.

In some ways, it's a much abbreviated take on the sort of quest in the Goldfinch, except it's a quest for human connection rather than a masterpiece of painting and its symbolism.  

Anyway, back to the Great Me, I've been getting a lovely lot of greetings, emails, ecards, texts and general good wishes today.  Lovely day.  Sunny, nothing on the calendar other than lazing about. 

I'll take it!

Reynard shows up

 Here's today's Advent Calendar door.  Reynard, fox of folklore and myth, taking a quiet nap with a friend.

And yesterday, I got all dressed up.  Found and put on The Official Pearls.

Handsome Son showed up with groceries and a marbled poundcake, which we dived into happily. He had apparently examined all the baked goods on offer and finally decided we'd both like this.  He eventually went home with half of what was left after we had had enough cake.  I must say, that sitting and being served cake and tea, and a friendly card, on a warm sofa, is a terrific birthday celebration.

And he brought down the box of Christmas stuff, all bits and bobs, really, so I set up the creche together with a display of handmade ornaments Handsome Partner had got from a colleague many years ago, and used to decorate his little fake tree.  Woven star on the roof of the stable.

Handsome Son picked out his favorite figurines and toys, and included an Izzy doll in the display on the mantelpiece. Dark, rainy morning, not good for pix.  But can you see the handcarved llama there, next to a doll.  I suggested putting him closer to the creche figures, but Handsome Son said, no, that might hurt the doll's feelings if we push her out!  I think he's got into the spirit of fantasy around here.

And the Dollivers and their dogs demanded, and got, a display of their own, complete with handmade felt stars, made in the Himalayas, if I remember right, which were a benefit for the Snow Leopard foundation.

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That's it, totally, for the season.  I feel as if I've done my bit now.  And my neighbor across the street has obligingly started with hanging lights outside, and a wreath and there's a huge tree in her living room, visible from the door, which I will enjoy a lot once she gets it decorated, as she usually does each year.

I think our little family may be in for an electronic Christmas.  Handsome Son's main laptop has started breaking down, after years of hard wear, and he's out shopping today for a replacement. It's his work laptop on which he's been doing his high tech part time project work.  Sad news there, it's going away at the end of the month. The project was based on a process which Adobe is withdrawing December 31. So he's handling it like a trouper, as he does everything.  It's a hit to his income, though.  On the good side, he won't have to buy the highest end laptop, just one that will accommodate his other testing gigs.

And my Android tablet is being overcome by upgrades in websites and browsers to the point where the processor is giving up the struggle.  I've used it constantly since 2012, so it's not too surprising. In tablet terms it's practically an antique.

Since I don't like Apple, find it overpriced and cultish, I've avoided going there, but the Android tablet world has not advanced.  They seem to have been overcome by Apple tablets, and there's little to find on the market, except for Samsung, the one with the reputation for bursting into flames.  So I'm reluctantly having to consider an iPad.  Which is interesting, in that there aren't any available until several weeks from now.  Seemingly the Apple elves have been overcome by demand, probably from pandemic changes, I'd guess. 

Sooooo, maybe in January I'll have an iPad and be functional again with a tablet.  Right now I'm overloading my phone, an Android with limited memory, and firing up my laptop much more.  The good news about my phone is that it will weather the upgrade to 4G.  It's on the Tracfone list of phones that don't need to be replaced when cell towers move to 4G at the end of December.  Another deadline.  Some of these were set to happen early this year, but the pandemic caused carriers like Verizon to rethink their timing, and push it back to the end of the year instead.

I plan to reimburse Handsome Son for the new laptop, since I was going to give him Christmas money anyway, may as well do it that way.  And I have to save up for my tablet.  Always something!   But here's the good thing:  I will be able to do it.  So there's that, too.

All in all, on balance, as the politicians say, all's good here.

Feast of Saint Lucia

 Also see Inger's blogpost for an authentic Swedish take on this. In fact, follow her while you're at it, she's a very interesting blogger. The link works for me, so I hope it does for you, too, with Blogger, you never know. 

Anyway, do you see the girls in white and the crown of candles?  Today's the day for Swedish people to celebrate the Feast of St. Lucia, where girls dress in white, the eldest with a crown of candles, to serve coffee and special  buns to their parents in bed in the early morning.  An American friend of mine of Swedish descent used to have her three daughters do this.

Also today, Handsome Son told me to expect our Great Big Birthday Extravaganza to happen this evening, since his time off works this way right now.  This involves my putting out crockery and a tray and then sitting on the sofa waiting for him to do the work of making tea and serving whatever nice thing he's bringing to eat.  Not bad.

I will be 82 in a couple of days, and that's 82 years old, NOT young.  I hate the glorification of youth to the point of not allowing people to say they're old when they are! I've earned that rank, and I'm happy to have been lucky enough to get here.  Almost twenty years already more than my parents got of life. So I have no problem being described as old, particularly when you consider the alternative.

Just because you're active, doing stuff, having ideas, and feeling well, doesn't mean you're young.  That's not the province of the young, it's for everyone.  And I don't say things like "in my day" because guess what, it's still my day!  So there.  Neener, neener. And other such indignant retorts.

Moving on before I fall apart laughing at myself, I now have to go get out my pearls.  They are my dressup item, brought out for birthdays, Christmas, Easter, and other such official holiday meal events.  A nice gift from Handsome Partner, long ago, they're real, and I love them.  I remember when he gave the to me long ago, first thing in the morning when I woke.  So I put them on right away, and there I was, wearing only a pearl necklace.  Nice day.  We did have fun.

Today I will be fully dressed, however, probably in hoodie and sweatpants, complete with pearls.

This is the season where I avoid Nutcracker, now that I no longer have a child in the house who needs to go to the local performance every year.  It was good as local performances went, with serious professionals dancing the principal roles, sometimes from New York ballet companies, since it was only an hour away by train.  And a lot of local folks getting hired as extras, or mice, or dancers if they knew how to waltz for the waltzing scene, all dressed up and having a lovely time.

Acting, and the theatre in general, isn't my thing at all. I really don't get how over the top it all is, and having known actors in my youf and seen firsthand what sort of needy people they were when they weren't on stage, well, no, not for me.

I grew up in the north of England, from mid childhood on, in a big industrial town.  Interesting, for what the BBC used to call the bleak English north, where people talked funny and couldn't hardly read, they thought, it was in fact a mecca of culture, theater, ballet, opera, the lot.

The major companies, Old Vic, Royal Ballet, then Sadler's Wells Ballet, Met opera, would try out chez us, giving us their entire season's repertoire over typically a two week span.  That's how I came to be exposed to the best ballet in the world, pretty much, and grand opera, and serious theater, Shakespeare an' all.  It was out of town tryouts, I guess.  And they knew it was a tough audience to please, because a lot of these coal miners and steelworkers and bricklayers and bus drivers were self educated and knew the Bard as well as the actors, also knew their grand opera just fine, whistling the arias at work.  Many were musicians, too, playing in brass and silver bands sponsored by their workplaces.

Since the traveling companies needed a lot of extras, they would hire locals to play bit parts and crowd scenes.  The favorite was Aida, where you need a stage army, and a lot of dark makeup for the people in the army.  The father of  one of my school friends was a bus driver by day, and worked Aida at night and matinees, as part of the stage army.  You got paid extra if you had to put on dark makeup, and keep it on, just touch it up for performances.  He really enjoyed the drama on stage, said it was much less demanding that the drama of drunks trying to crowed onto his bus when he was driving the last route of the day. It was funny if you happened to see an normally pale and now unusually dusky guy working on a building site, or somewhere, , and realize he must be working Aida at night.  This was back in the fifties when the population was pretty much lily white.

The only thing was that the stage was large, but not huge, likewise the budget for the army, so they hired the minimum number, had them march off the stage and run like maniacs to get back across and join on the the marchers still processing across.  He said it was pretty good sprinting practice.

My mother would buy standing seats, all she could afford, for the entire two weeks of operas and take me with her or some one else, to use the second standing place. I remember going to "Maritana"  when I was about seven, and still remember the blue dress of, I guess, Maritana, and the dramatic faint she did while still belting out her aria.  This was what always puzzled me.  How come the soprano was dying in an attic or fatally stabbed or strangled or something and still projecting her voice to the back row of the nosebleed section, huh?  Unlikely.  In fact I never did take to opera, too much bloviating for my taste.  And they kept on stopping to sing arias just when the plot was getting going.  The recitative was what annoyed me though, that talking while singing stuff between arias.  This is all very irreverent, and I do revere the voices and skills of the best singers, I'd just rather hear them in recital than overdressed and overacting on stage.

We also got some wonderful soloists locally.  Dogonart, my older sister, who is sometimes seen in the comments here, took me with her to a few recitals. I remember vividly Beryl Kimber, the violinist, and Eileen Joyce, the pianist at the town hall. I think it was some kind of commonwealth tour or something, since I believe they were Australian.  And wonderful performers.  I was just a young kid, maybe eight, and still remember the experience. Which shows you it's worth taking kids to events that might seem over their heads, as long as they can be trusted not to disrupt the proceedings.

Oh, funny story from my voice teacher a few years ago:  she had been an opera singer, moved in all those circles, knew Kirsten Flagstad, massively Wagnerian powerful singer.  Now, singers all do warmups to get their voice clear and up into the mask of the face, that's the bit where your sinuses come, very important for projection, the squillo, and how they can soar above the full orchestra all the way up to the eighth circle.  And the warmups can sound pretty comic, like the tenor singing naming the enemy naming the enemy up and down the scale. Or one I had to learn: my fa my fa my faaaather, up and down different chords to extend the range.

Anyway, Ms. Flagstad, in her New York hotel, ahead of her Met performance that night in some part of the Ring cycle, was busy doing loud warmups, which probably sounded like nothing on earth. Big woman, massive vocal chords, terrific amplification.  Another guest, hearing the racket, thought someone had broken in and there was an assault under way, called the police, who showed up all concerned, and found Ms. F. puzzled and wondering why they'd interrupted her normal routine.

Off to find my pearls now.

The star arrives

 The snowshoe hare got the elf's attention and showed him where the Star is approaching.

And, on the reading front, I found a mystery writer I'd never heard of.  Turns out she had a lot of Christie's ideas before Christie did, what with impersonation, mutual protection, the amateur sleuth along with the official police, the unknown stranger, the country house, the maids and butlers. The Cosy, in fact.

And since she was writing in the Golden Age, where marketing was king, the Christie machine got ahead of her, and now she's scarcely heard of.  But this is a rattlin' good story, all the same.  About as serious as a Christie, and pretty puzzling, too.  I had several ideas about whodunit, but was wrong in the end. So I recommend this.  My library only has this one, but I managed to get some low cost other ones for my Kindle. Winter afternoon reading.

And I've been thinking about cabbage and leeks, yes, my life is riveting, partly because I had supplies of them in the freezer waiting for me to do something about them.  I love this vegetarian book of Ottolenghi's and even if you never cook from it, it's beautiful to handle and just see the photography.  I remembered having made an elaborate vegetable pie thing out of here ages ago, so I took a look.

And quickly found that since I have neither puff pastry, nor Gorgonzola, nor broccoli, I was a bit stymied with this recipe.  But I recommend it if you have the ingredients.

 I remembered some cabbage pie ideas from YouTube, still held back by a lack of cheese, it's on the grocery list for this week, decided to go to war with the food I had.

Namely, leek whites, red cabbage, cooked pumpkin, white onions, nice addition of capers. 

Three eggs, flour, nutmeg, a spoonful of plain yogurt, Dijon mustard, beaten up as a sauce.

Then all baked at 400 for about 40 minutes, resulting in this interesting stuff

The roast potatoes were just fine, the cabbage mixture lacked a little oomph, so after I sampled it I decided it might work better as a soup.  Sooooooo, a quart of chicken broth and a dash of lemon juice later, simmering and  blender at work, here it comes, with a sprig of lemon balm to decorate it

It's really odd to have a tangy soup, which  tastes pretty good, and looks like dessert.  But if you can get past expecting it to be some fruit deal because of  the color, it's fine.

Santa ammo dump? and prayer plant

Today's advent calendar day opens to what might be an ammo dump of snowballs ready to pelt the other elves and gnomes.  Or maybe a lighted Christmas tree. Either way, the white rabbit, probably really a  snowshoe hare, for the season, keeps her back firmly turned

And yesterday my next door neighbor Amitha, who's been receiving plants from me, retaliated, I mean reciprocated, with a nice cutting of prayer plant and a bit of pothos, which are now in water on the kitchen windowsill, until they get more roots and I get more mojo to plant them.

She also told me they're off to India for a month, in the next few days.  They have old parents, and I think they've been worried about them.

Since school is virtual, as is her husband's job, they can move like this without major interruption, except for the little matter of getting halfway round the planet,  On a plane, a place I wouldn't care to be for many hours right now.  I'll miss them, the kids especially.

And I got this weekend's royal viewing, it's not a weekend without royal scandal, including the hats, which are often the greatest scandal of all.

Here's what we always suspected, and now it does seem to be true. Not surprising since they were a security risk, what with his having access to all the secret papers as King, leaving them lying around unlocked, with dodgy people galore in the house, well, mansion, really, and being great pals with Hitler and other chums.

So this will be good. 

Meanwhile back at the fence: after all the alerts, warnings, threats about trees and that, they now tell us that, after all, they still don't know when they can start.  I guess the supply chain for fences has been yanked around by covid-19. Unless the fencing people have retooled to make vaccine, who knows. No, that was definitely a joke, in case anyone wonders.

What I wonder is if people who can't take the flu shot will be able to safely take the covid vaccine. Or if once again we'll be begging everyone around us who can take it, to do so for all our sakes. It's a while before I need to know that, since I doubt if the general population is going to see supplies before next summer earliest.

So this morning, walk done, more of a chore than a pleasure at the moment, what with the low winter energy, library done, therapy lamp session done, check, check, check, blogpost about to go out, that part is fun, I'm about to have a bowl of vichyssoise for lunch.

Then bake cornbread muffins this afternoon in anticipation of a visit from Handsome Son.

The stars are out

 

Today's Advent Calendar window. 

I must get Handsome Son next time he's over, to bring down the Christmas decorations, such as they are, from the high shelf in the art closet.

I'll probably heap them around, interspersed with small dolls and animals. No tree. I'm not a fan of fake ones, and I'm deadly allergic to real cut ones in the house.

But it will be festive enough to suit them as will see it. I don't get much enthusiasm going till later in the month, in case you wondered at this downbeat plan!

This year I plan not to cut out stars. Nor weave them in paper. At least that's this morning's thinking. We'll see.

Bring a Torch Jeanette, Isabella

 Do you know that old carol?  We learned it at school.  It's about bringing lighted torches, to see the stable and visit with the baby in the manger.  Here's an elf all ready to make his way there.

And reading is gripping this Tonstant Weader (Dorothy Parker, in case you're not familiar), with yet another Maisie Dobbs, on Kindle via my library app

She's in Gibraltar at the time of the Spanish Civil war, intrigue, murder, spying, her own grief to deal with, a very exciting and moving read.  Guernica features.  In fact I had to stop there this morning, overcome by that.  The huge Picasso masterwork based on that atrocity was almost too much to deal with. I saw it in Washington, I believe. I think it's now housed in the UN building.

I knew Spanish people, refugees from Franco's Spain, outlawed by his regime, when I was a kid in England. Along with all the Poles, Latvians, Lithuanians, Estonians, and later Hungarians.  The Spaniards were from Barcelona, an outpost of anti Franco resistance.  They couldn't return until he died.

 Of atrocities, the surprise attack by Italian and German bombers on Guernica, the deliberate slaughter and complete destruction of a small unprotected Spanish  town with women and children out in the marketplace, clearly visible to the bombers, in a supposedly neutral country, ranks as one of the many unforgivable. After I recover, I'll continue reading.

And here's the second part of the Shanghai Girls novel, thank you Ellen, for mentioning it, or I might not have realized there was another part.  This is gripping enough that when I started reading yesterday morning, I put my breakfast toast into the toaster oven, and completely forgot it, so there was a nice piece of buttered charcoal for breakfast.

Here, Joy, the daughter in the Shanghai Girls book, goes to China in a quixotic mission to find her real father, having suddenly found out the person she thought was her mother is her aunt, and the person she thought was her father was no relation, though he cared for her as his own.  And Pearl, one of the Shanghai Girls, her aunt, not her mother, goes in search of her, risking the dangers of red China and the chances of never being able to return.  Neither of them has any idea what China has become, since the American newspapers were anti Communist  propaganda more than news at that time.

Then, in better news, today was the day of the Great Pickup of The Holiday Box Lunch at the town hall.  And it turned out to be very good indeed, well organized, freezing cold Recreation Dept staff out there in the parking lot, checking, running, picking lunches, delivering to drivers, all very cheerful despite the bitter cold and threat of snow.

I've already emailed a huge thank you to all of them.  The police department has undertaken to deliver meals to any seniors who can't get in to pick up, sometime this afternoon. The meals were handed over hot, and only needed a bit of reheating once I got home.  I had thought about doing another errand before I went home but changed my mind, which is good, because the weather changed dramatically.

Veggie lasagna, from a good local caterer, enough for two meals for the likes of me,   As you see, tomorrow's lunch on the left, today's on the right.

And a chocolate chip cookie!  My tax dollars well spent today, anyway. Very happy senior here.

 And as I was almost home, the snow, forecast for today, was just starting.  Home before it got underway.

This afternoon is about being under a warm blankie, reading Maisie and maybe Joy, too.