New Year's Eve

New Year's Eve always seems like a non-holiday to me. I'm just not a party girl. I don't like crowds and I don't get drunk and I am uncomfortable making small talk with people I don't know - so a New Year's Eve Party is just not for me. Besides, I'd never have something to wear.

I used to go to my sister's, with the rest of the family, for pizza and pinball tournaments - one year we even got Grandma K to participate, eyes shining and that wonderful smile lighting up the place. But that hasn't often been an option for me - Greg and Janet make great pizza but it's just too far away!

Waiting up for the new year countdown is always a 'letdown' instead. Once the toast has been proposed and the kiss exchanged, we are worn down sufficiently by the day that we are fast asleep in bed by quarter after the hour. (Sometimes less, depending on whether we are in a place with two sinks so we can both brush our teeth at the same time - just to give you an idea of the parameters here...) (Huh - OLD people, you say.)

And then there is the contemplation of challenges to come, like how many months will I write " '05" on my checks? (Two years ago I was so confused I reverted back to writing '86, but that's another story.)

Nope, just not my holiday.

But if it's yours - Happy New Year!

Tidying up

I spent some time today tidying up my blog – I’ve been getting lazy in my ‘production’ by not doing a spell check and forgetting sometimes to standardize my font… Anyway, I’m going back to my old method of writing in a word document and then transferring to the blog so I can avoid embarrassing myself. Besides never managing to spell ‘embarrassing’ right – a word I seem to use a lot! – I know it is hopeless to think I would ever spell ‘scissors’ right and I really should have checked on 'Whidbey' Island. Good grief! Thank you to anyone reading this who blushed on my behalf.

Frik and Maddie

It's been interesting to watch my cats adjust to their new lives. Maddie just moved right in, started a new routine, and pretty much followed the instructions I've been trying to get through to them via telepathy - "Stay With Mama!" Frik, the sensitive one, has had a harder time. He spent the first week in the apartment hiding in the lining of the box spring under the bed. Too many odd smells - that Maddie didn't mind smelling - for him. But after several weeks of our smells - Maddie's probably - on the furniture and carpets, he's come out of the closet, so to speak. They both revived their habit of mooching some milk in the morning to lick off the countertop - old habits are reassuring, I guess. And we're even back to playing 'string' in the morning.

We are on the third floor in a very wooded area so our windows look out right into the trees - and there are birds and squirrels all over the place. But I can't get the cats to look. Maddie will look down at the parking lot in the front, but not at the trees in the back. Frik abhors nature - won't even sit at the window. Too bad. They're missing quite a show.

The apartment comes with a cleaning service - which I tried to get out of but can't. (I find it embarrassing, for one thing, but am afraid that the cats will get out while they are here for another.) And yes, when they showed up last week Frik almost had a heart attack. Maddie got stuck under the bed, which was a real problem because they started by replacing the sheets. But Frik headed for the kitchen and managed to squeeze himself above the upper cabinets just under the ceiling, where he peered out with wide eyes looking straight into mine. Maddie soon came shooting out from under the bed and fled into my lap, until I showed her where Frik was, and then she joined him. 'Housekeeping' comes again tomorrow - I am hoping they have the drill down and will go to their 'safe place' right away!

I bet they'd feel better with their own 'stuff.' I know I would!

Adventures

I posted some pictures over the weekend but didn't explain any of them...

We are really excited about the ferries and the islands in the Sound, as well as the Olympic Peninsula - and since those are the places currently without snow and icy roads, those are the places we've headed to. One day we caught the ferry at Mukilteo (where there is a very cute lighthouse) and drove up through Whidbey Island (to Admiralty Head Lighthouse where they had the big wreath on the building - I'm a sucker for lighthouses,) across the Deception Pass Bridge (picture) to Fidalgo Island and then through Oak Harbor, Anacortes and back across the bridge to Mt Vernon. We thought we'd find another scrumptious lunch place but didn't! More research will be necessary before we try THAT route again! The last trip was down I-5 through Olympia and then across to the Pacific Coast to Ocean Shores, Copalis Beach and Pacific Beach. The next trip is going to be to Port Angeles and on to Hurricane Ridge where there are great views of the Sound. I'm a sucker for a good view too. We're finding lots of hiking places, and now have a great hiking book with some reasonable 'old people' hikes - including a whole section on 'best hikes for berry picking!'

Lighthouses and ferries and berries. I think I've died and gone to heaven.

Ramon

We are renting a private mailbox from one of those mail/package service places and I was in there this morning (mailing the phone from yesterday's aggravation.) I am always amazed that those places offer absolutely everything related to mailing something - the 'value added' concept. They have the space and the personnel - and they are maximizing them both by thinking of - and providing - every possible thing they can. Mailing labels, shipping, boxes, wrapping paper, copy services, postage stamps, fax services... Very efficient. A model of American ingenuity.

So I was interested, as I drove by another place on my way home, in the same concept applied to a different industry. There is a large building on an odd corner lot with basement parking and access from all sides. In it "Ramon" has created a family of businesses to capture the auto market - Ramon's Auto Parts, Ramon's Brake Service, Ramon's Car Wash, Ramon's Auto Detailing. But in the one final corner of his building, I think Ramon might have lost his vision of the concept, for there, in bold lettering, just like the rest, is "Ramon's Beauty Salon."

I just wonder who his customers are???

Spices

According the McCormick spice company's web site, ground spices are good for 2-3 years and then should be replaced. Since I didn't bring any 'spices' with me from my kitchen at home, I am replacing things now and wondering just how old some of my other stuff is. Hmmmmm...

I once had a large bottle of peppercorns that I bought when I lived in Arizona in the 70s and still had when I moved from Alaska in '96. About twice a year I would cook up a batch of navy bean soup and, since the recipe called for 3 peppercorns, that was the rate I was using up the bottle. My father was referring to them as 'ancient Indian peppercorns' by then and shamed me into getting rid of them. Relics. Too bad Vanilla Extract, at its current price, doesn't last that long!

Anyway, these are the thoughts I am using to keep others at bay. Because, unfortunately, I spent the day fighting with my cell phone company trying to buy a new phone - I am even eligible to buy a new phone - when they couldn't seem to make that happen. Policy roadblocks that no one seems interested in 'problem solving' around, database mistakes, call transfers and general 'passing the buck' moves were the "spices" of my day today. And I got in a stew, that's for sure.

Finally, one person had all the right 'customer service' ideas and another actually managed to make the sale. It took 3 visits to 2 different stores and no fewer than 3 hours on the phone in a half dozen different calls (OK, I might be exaggerating there but, really!) I actually had to cry on the phone to make it happen. (Shameless, I am.)

But it ruined our day. And I probably didn't even manage to ruin theirs in the process. Not really the sort of spice I want in my life.

I have such good intentions, great resolve, solid focus... and then there it goes.

It is always the little things that push me over the edge. The big stuff I can handle, but give me little frustrations on top and I am lost.

I need to learn how to deal with 'spices.'

A Hundred Million Miracles

It is perhaps an obscure song from the (possibly also obscure) musical 'Flower Drum Song' - a song about the amazing in the mundane - and it has been going through my head all day.

"A Hundred Million Miracles."

The song is of these things: A toddler tries to walk for the first time and almost doesn't fall down; a girl gets a tan from a sun that is a hundred million miles away; a bird's egg hatches into feathers and beaks and legs...the sun keeps rising. We don't know how or why such a miracle keeps happening, "but somehow or other it will."

Maybe that was my gift today. A reminder that there are a hundred million miracles in my life that will, evidently, keep happening. Somehow or other this amazing man loves me; this incredible young man is my son; this loving, caring, funny, bright woman is my mother, and I have this huge family who laughs together, keeps each other company and loves each other - one and all. All this keeps going on, in spite of challenges, frustrations, disappointments, sicknesses, setbacks of all sorts... Amazing. Miraculous, even.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

It's Just Not Right

Shopping, decorating, present wrapping, readying for the Christmas feast. Cookie baking, nut cracking, visiting, gift delivering. Package mailing, family gathering arranging, mistletoe hanging, Christmas tree watering. Fallen-needle vacuuming. More shopping.

Choir practicing, card addressing, carol playing, evergreen wreath smelling.

All those lovely preparations; all that frantic activity.

I'm not doing any of it. It feels weird. It's just not right.

I love Christmas time. Since it is my birthday time too - I was a Christmas Eve baby - it is really MY big holiday for the year. I don't usually find it stressful or frantic, even though I'm not one of those people who has just the right gifts purchased and wrapped 3 months in advance. Since my family has had a long tradition of giving tree ornaments instead of expensive gifts, I have an incredibly beautiful tree every year. And since I started collecting 'Santas' about 10 years ago, my house is usually decorated with that jolly old elf in dozens of places - peeking out from under lamp shades, hanging from curtain rods, propped on bookshelves, ledges and tables. (Mark wanted them counted last year - and there were maybe of 80 of them!)

And then there is the Christmas Cantata. I don't remember when we started doing that as a family - but it was years ago. I am from a 'singing' family (which surprises guests to birthday parties when we sing 'Happy Birthday' in perfect key) and we sang in a church choir together years ago and learned a 'Cantata' that I managed to also learn to play on the piano. For many years, we gathered over Christmas to sing it together - 4 part harmony and full choir voice strength (it is a BIG family.) My father would do the narration part in between and just sit there and grin the whole time we were singing.

But this year the piano is in Kentucky, I'm in Seattle, and the rest of the singers are in Arizona.

I'm missing it this year, but next year... look out!

Jig Saw Puzzles again

I am back on jig saw puzzles - not the computer kind, but the real ones with pieces for cats to bat around and light to glare on. The kind that a well placed snip of the scissors gives temporary satisfaction to - and delayed frustration of course. The kind that allows mindless consideration to tough things to consider. Or no consideration at all.

Yep - just the ticket in uncertain times.

Slogans

Mark has declared that he will never buy another Toyota truck since they have adopted the (in his words) ridiculous slogan "Moving you forward." He's been subjected to all sorts of well-meaning business presentations in which the speaker talks about how they are going to "move forward" on their projects or plans - and obviously hates the expression. In his world of very large intellects AND vocabularies, mixing up temporal and spatial metaphors is simply wrong.

(Besides that, he doesn't like the new front grill design.)

I've been fascinated with slogans since getting a peek at the process as the Sonoma County Visitor's Bureau tried to adopt one. They had a long list of short phrases that they were trying to use to depict wine country, the Pacific Coast, recreation, food, spa treatments... It was silly. Sorry.

And of course Kentucky was recently embroiled in battle over its new slogan "Unbridled Spirit" with newspaper editors dissing the Governor about the money spent to come up with it (was it $2MM?) and the number of times he used it in his speech at the Kentucky Derby (also 2 million?) Funny stuff.

With that sort of record, I'm betting Toyota makes a change before Mark is forced to try another make of small truck, poor thing. Hopefully the grill design changes too.

Actually, I think 'moving forward' would be a good slogan for us, at this point...

Figured it out!

I finally figured out what was wrong with the time stamp on the blog - I have it set for Eastern time still - there are all kinds of settings on Blogger and I just missed that one! So now it should be OK - no insomnia or anything! Good grief. Life shouldn't be so complicated!

Taking the Ferry

A great adventure! We caught the ferry to Bainbridge (or Bremerton or some other B name that I can't get straight) and drove around on the Olympic Peninsula and found a great restaurant and shops in Poulsbo (which we can't pronounce) and just had a GREAT time! (Even if we did get lost on the way there and stuck in a big traffic jam on the way back - both of which we can avoid the next time.) And the best thing was that we picked up all sorts of brochures and fliers and ads for other attractions and destinations. We're going to be great tour guides again for anyone who comes to visit!

The next destination just has to be out to the coast - I badly need my fix of the Pacific Ocean!

Exploring

We had a bit of a disappointment today with the drive around the lake. It turns out that 'lakefront' property takes precedence over road views - don't know why I didn't realize that before! Anyway, we found our way, and found our way home again - and to several places in between so we are slowly expanding our new world. It wasn't quite as cold today either!

I found a book on 'Sunday drives' in Washington and now am dying to drive out to the Olympic Peninsula but we will have to actually get going early enough in the morning to do that - and haven't yet. I keep forgetting how far north we are (but not in Alaska, so it really doesn't seem like we are very far north...) and am surprised by how low the sun is in the sky. We were out around noon and the sun was looking like 4pm! Obviously it wasn't going to get any higher.

Anyway, here is Lake Sammamish:

Late, but sincere...

I took pictures in Seattle last weekend, but somehow didn't manage to get them uploaded, until now. Better late than never!

Finding our way

I did a little exploring yesterday and found the big Bellevue shopping mall - right in the middle of downtown Bellevue with the big hotels and office buildings and all the holiday traffic. (It would have helped if Frik had been there to purr comfortingly to me along the way but I had to make do with humming Christmas carols to myself and saying "oh dear... oh dear... oh dear...") But I made it and even wandered around in it a bit before losing my nerve and heading for home. All the wonderful stores are in it (Nordstroms!) and restaurants like Ruth's Chris Steakhouse and PF Chang's and Cheesecake Factory. Things are looking up, I'd say.

I really do enjoy exploring a new place - part of why I really like the whole moving business. Here, for example, we are near a big lake and there is a wonderful little road that, according to the map, runs all the way around it. That sounds like a "this weekend" destination! I really need to find a book store and look for local guidebooks too. We need some distractions from those things over which we have no control.

In the meantime, two batches of cookies are done. Onward!

Christmas Cookies

I don't know when I started with the marathon Christmas Cookie Baking habit but it was certainly years ago. I have a sweet tooth that won't quit, but that isn't even the reason I do it. I just love to make them, and to have them around, and to give them to people. (All of which was fine when I was in Alaska and had a bunch of people to give them TO. Not so much here...)

But the whole process of pouring over the recipe collection, looking in magazines for new possibilities, and then ending up deciding, as I do every year, on the same 8 or 9 varieties that I just can't have Christmas without, is as much a part of Christmas for me as the tree. I line up all the ingredients on the counter (and I hate messy countertops - just to give you an idea of how far this obsession has gone!) and I go from one batch to another to another, the whole point being to have them all done and fresh and beautiful at the same time. Then you can put together a really pretty cookie tray. And have a lot of choices. (Yes, I know that is probably not sufficient rationalization, but it's all I've got.) I just like to have them.

I did add 'Butterscotch Cream Bells' from a magazine some years ago, and last year tried 'Coconut Cranberry Chews' which were a real hit (and festive looking besides.) But the cut-out cookies are my favorite, probably from the sentimental value of years of help from Todd in cutting and decorating. To this day I am less interested in getting a 'beautifully decorated' cookie than in just the process of making them.

One year, when Todd was little, we were headed to Tucson from Alaska for Christmas. On our overnight delay in Seattle Todd was a little droopy and finally held up one finger and pointed to a small round pox that had appeared on it and asked 'what is this?' Chicken pox, of course. We were halfway there and decided to just go on rather than back home, and we spent a quiet several days at my mother's house while he developed more and more spots. We used those days to bake Christmas Cookies, of course. And to help him with the itching, we 'decorated' him with corn starch (does that sound right?) while we were decorating the cut-out cookies with colored sugar. There is nothing quite like hearing little ones giggle and laugh when you know they are sick. (I guess my brother's kids all came down with chicken pox then too? And my brother as well, if I remember right. Sorry!!!)

Anyway, I know that if Todd were here he would still help me make cookies. And I know Mark will appreciate them as much as I will. And I hope his new work team will put up with them too because this year I have no one else to pawn them off on!

Hope you are enjoying your Christmas preparations as well!

Sure enough...

Today's news included an article about how consumer prices have only increased by very modest amounts and the experts are confident that there is no inflation. I see...

Not paying attention

I know that I can get in my own little world a lot of the time, and not pay attention to the little things that eventually will become big things. But yesterday at the grocery store I was trying to buy those little things that are needed to bake Christmas cookies and reached for the Vanilla Extract. A single bottle of real vanilla cost $29!!!

How could that be? As far as I know it isn't a petroleum product. It isn't connected to the housing market except in the loosest possible sense. $29?

How many teaspoons are in a bottle of vanilla?

What is happening to our economy? I come away from the store with basically the same basket of groceries that 5 years ago cost me $100 and now costs almost $300 - even with the fake vanilla, not the real stuff, in my cart. Are we not supposed to notice? Every day there are stories in the news about economic indicators - up and down and sideways and so convoluted that there can't possibly be any conclusion about the data in any acceptable scientific way of looking at data. But we continue to get positive reports about how we are ticking along just fine. Good grief.

We are not 'fine.' We're not 'fine' at all.

Lost in the Space/Time Continuum

My brother just pointed out that the time signature on my postings is suggesting insomnia again - but that isn't the case, actually. My computer thinks, for some reason, that it is 12:40 am when it is actually 1:40 pm - probably a result of the frozen battery problems it suffered along the way from Kentucky, coupled with the fact that I forgot to change its time zone. (But I would have thought time postings would be 'blogger' time, not my computer time... Another mystery of blogging, I guess.) Anyway, I don't have insomnia but I AM confused about where and when I am, as it were.

(I was watching 'The Triangle' on Sci Fi last night - or at least I think it was last night - and they, too, were having trouble with the space/time continuum.)

I've lived in enough places over the past few years that I am sometimes confused, when I wake up in the middle of the night, with where I am - which wall is the bed against and, if I got up to go to the bathroom, where, exactly would that bathroom be? Not good. Which road would I take to go to the grocery store? And what would the name of that store be, if I even found it? Very confusing. And having moved from Eastern to Pacific time over the last week, we are finding that bedtime is not at all the right time for going to sleep, making waking time not at all right either.

A one-bedroom apartment furnished with rental furnishings just doesn't feel right space-wise. Nightfall happening at 4:30 pm doesn't feel quite right either.

The cats are hiding under the bed. I'm tempted to do the same. But then where would I be when I came out?

This 'space/time' business is better left to the experts!

More trip pictures

Besides the snow and big mountains, wildlife was everywhere. We saw dozens of deer, huge herds of antelope, a bunch of bald eagles and even a few buffalo. I was looking through pictures this afternoon and thought I'd post a few...









Taking pictures through a dirty truck window while barreling down the highway at 70 mph (well, OK, maybe sometimes closer to 80...) doesn't really make for award-winning photography. But we have enough to jog the memory.

Three words: Acres of Clams

We made it! In spite of the cold and my back ache and the cats sneezing and not getting much sleep...

Seattle is beautiful. And these are SERIOUS mountains, around here.

We are settled in our temporary housing, have already found and wandered happily in a Fred Meyers store (if you've never been to a Freddy's, you are really missing something!) and are ready to explore. The traffic is a little intimidating though. Will they understand and be forgiving, on the road, when they see our Kentucky license plate?

Mark has been sustained through the long journey by visions of Ivar's 'Acres of Clams' seafood restaurant. Over and over through the past few days he's said to me "I have 3 words for you... " So that is our goal for the weekend - Ivar's.

Acres of Clams. Yum!

It's Cold!

It is very, very cold. Bitterly cold, according to the weather channel. But we went to see Mt Rushmore anyway - had the place to ourselves! (Except for the mountain goats...)

South Dakota

There are 101 roadside signs announcing WALL DRUG as you drive west along I-90 in South Dakota. They advertise various categories of merchandise (including 5 cent coffee, so rare a thing that they eliminated the cent sign from the computer keyboard!) A bunch of the billboards simply announce that you can get free ice water if you stop there. An amazing place, Wall Drug. That's the thing about South Dakota. For the most part they don't have anything to attract tourists except for the very big things - like Mt Rushmore and the Badlands - so the rest of the state is left with having to create attractions to milk off the excess. Hence, things like Wall Drug, and the Reptile Emporium, and 1880's Town. (Sort of like 'The Thing' in Arizona!)

So we spent the day yesterday counting WALL DRUG signs as we drove through the state, and watching the light snow blow across the road. It is very cold here. In two days we'll be on our way again - hoping the storms will have blown through. (I'm sure that will be the case, since I won the turkey wishbone break and that was my wish.)