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Well. The past week included more collisions than I would have cared for with figurative handbaskets and pavers, but I managed to get to bed within an hour of either side of midnight most nights. (The exception was the night before nochevieja, when filing all the FSA paperwork and herding Picasso ducks to the designer kept the candles burning past 3:30 a.m.) Yesterday I closed my work laptop by 5:30 p.m. (in time to catch Ailey's Revelations Through the Decades while the streaming window was open) and my personal laptop by 11:45 p.m. (with a promise to myself to refrain from checking social media until after noon today, which I kept).
This current round of reflux has been enough of a nuisance for me to dial back on citrus and other trigger foods for a while. I'd bought a sale bag of grapefruits before deciding this needed to happen. Fortunately, I now have water-bath canning in my culinary toolbox:
I also prepared a batch of pickled clementines two days ago. One of the jars didn't seal properly, though, resulting in orange syrup splattering across my counter yesterday morning. (At least I tested it before delivering it to the recipient!) So far, the seals on the jars of tomatoes I canned back in October-November have definitely done their job; I usually have to pry them off with a knife, and the jar I used in Wednesday's oxtail stew was no exception.
For Thursday, the BYM picked up ribs and beer from Various Artists Brewing. A week earlier, I'd picked up a Feast of Seven Fishes from Nicky's Coal Fired. It ended up covering both Christmas lunch and dinner, plus a cannoli nightcap on Boxing Day and a risotto break the following week. I'm dreaming about re-creating the baked clams, and getting the pasta again. (The octopus in the seafood salad was also outstanding, but that's one I'll leave to the professionals.)
Christmas Eve also included a Zoom service and social hour hosted by my church.
I'd contributed tracks to three of the carols, and the video for a modern setting of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (way less lugubrious than the traditional Calkin hymn!) was created by Trigg. I had been on the fence about catching the service (I worked fifteen minutes into it), but I was especially glad that I had done so when I saw the reactions in the chat as the segment aired. It's archived on YouTube (the carol starts at 42:27):
As many of you know by now, some shithead blew himself up on Christmas Day and took part of downtown Nashville with him, and other shitheads had come to my city to party because our governor and lege are for all intents and purposes pro-death. As things are, I have little patience for whining (my own included) at the best of times, and absolutely none left for people whose fucking inability to respect science and other humans means I probably won't get to waltz again until 2025. (And, if you're new here, that last phrase is shorthand for All The Things, including sick friends and bereaved/unemployed colleagues and the many other things far more important than my endorphins.)
When he heard the explosion (we live around three miles from where the RV was parked), the BYM thought it was someone's transformer going kerblooey. I mistook it for a weird, especially loud clap of thunder. He spent part of the morning grousing about speculation outpacing facts on his social media feeds. (Why, yes, we deserve each other . . .) I took a perverse interest in the far slower transmission of the news compared to that of the March tornado, in terms of concerned texts trickling into my phone over a few days instead ofblowing it up ; March's same-morning flurry. (It's not a legit comparison for numerous reasons, including people not checking the news during a long weekend, both of us being active online before the headlines started showing up in mainstream media, the tornado being at 1 a.m. vs. the bombing at 6:30 a.m. and the tornado literally striking much closer to our house. Speaking of which, a tree crew finally took out the giant last week. It required a bulldozer, chainsaws, and axes.)
Christmas itself was marvelous. Like today, I jettisoned my extensive to-do list in favor of a long nap, and I have no regrets. (Aiming for much more sleep in 2021 is definitely going to be a thing here.) Because of the title of this entry, I will note that the bounty included apricot preserves from American Spoon (all the more delightful because I had talked myself out of ordering from them just a day or two earlier). Because of the title of this blog, I feel compelled to celebrate here the most over-the-top present I opened that morning:
That's a bar of zirconium, y'all. Carefully machined, sanded, and polished by my friend Bill, with its own fitted cherry stand. I've done enough wood- and metalwork to have an idea of how long it took (augmented by conversations with and messages from Bill this year about his adventures in acquiring and working with other elements. He had particularly sulfurous comments about antimony . . .). I can't stop admiring it. :)
2020 ended with the BYM turning in an hour before midnight. I wasn't making a point of staying up (I'm usually the one dozing off before the guitar falls) but there had been a poem I had been trying to write all month, so I buckled down to fleshing it out and hit the Submittable button forty minutes before midnight (and again at twenty minutes 'til for another packet). Then I put away laundry while peeking at the lights still up on my street and on Holly. A year ago the ones on Holly would not have been visible because of trees the tornado knocked down.
Tonight's dinner is leftover rice with black-eyed peas and Chinese sausage, with sparkling wine. It reached 74 F in parts of Nashville today, so I spent part of the afternoon cutting spotted leaves off the rosebushes, and tomorrow I'll spray them.
Friends, here's to a year with an abundance of roses and other rewards. And, if you aren't blogging or tweeting about your goings-on, drop me a line on what you are seeing, hearing, tasting, or considering? Message me for my address if you'd rather send (and get) a (post)card. :)
This current round of reflux has been enough of a nuisance for me to dial back on citrus and other trigger foods for a while. I'd bought a sale bag of grapefruits before deciding this needed to happen. Fortunately, I now have water-bath canning in my culinary toolbox:
I also prepared a batch of pickled clementines two days ago. One of the jars didn't seal properly, though, resulting in orange syrup splattering across my counter yesterday morning. (At least I tested it before delivering it to the recipient!) So far, the seals on the jars of tomatoes I canned back in October-November have definitely done their job; I usually have to pry them off with a knife, and the jar I used in Wednesday's oxtail stew was no exception.
For Thursday, the BYM picked up ribs and beer from Various Artists Brewing. A week earlier, I'd picked up a Feast of Seven Fishes from Nicky's Coal Fired. It ended up covering both Christmas lunch and dinner, plus a cannoli nightcap on Boxing Day and a risotto break the following week. I'm dreaming about re-creating the baked clams, and getting the pasta again. (The octopus in the seafood salad was also outstanding, but that's one I'll leave to the professionals.)
Christmas Eve also included a Zoom service and social hour hosted by my church.
I'd contributed tracks to three of the carols, and the video for a modern setting of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (way less lugubrious than the traditional Calkin hymn!) was created by Trigg. I had been on the fence about catching the service (I worked fifteen minutes into it), but I was especially glad that I had done so when I saw the reactions in the chat as the segment aired. It's archived on YouTube (the carol starts at 42:27):
As many of you know by now, some shithead blew himself up on Christmas Day and took part of downtown Nashville with him, and other shitheads had come to my city to party because our governor and lege are for all intents and purposes pro-death. As things are, I have little patience for whining (my own included) at the best of times, and absolutely none left for people whose fucking inability to respect science and other humans means I probably won't get to waltz again until 2025. (And, if you're new here, that last phrase is shorthand for All The Things, including sick friends and bereaved/unemployed colleagues and the many other things far more important than my endorphins.)
When he heard the explosion (we live around three miles from where the RV was parked), the BYM thought it was someone's transformer going kerblooey. I mistook it for a weird, especially loud clap of thunder. He spent part of the morning grousing about speculation outpacing facts on his social media feeds. (Why, yes, we deserve each other . . .) I took a perverse interest in the far slower transmission of the news compared to that of the March tornado, in terms of concerned texts trickling into my phone over a few days instead of
Christmas itself was marvelous. Like today, I jettisoned my extensive to-do list in favor of a long nap, and I have no regrets. (Aiming for much more sleep in 2021 is definitely going to be a thing here.) Because of the title of this entry, I will note that the bounty included apricot preserves from American Spoon (all the more delightful because I had talked myself out of ordering from them just a day or two earlier). Because of the title of this blog, I feel compelled to celebrate here the most over-the-top present I opened that morning:
That's a bar of zirconium, y'all. Carefully machined, sanded, and polished by my friend Bill, with its own fitted cherry stand. I've done enough wood- and metalwork to have an idea of how long it took (augmented by conversations with and messages from Bill this year about his adventures in acquiring and working with other elements. He had particularly sulfurous comments about antimony . . .). I can't stop admiring it. :)
2020 ended with the BYM turning in an hour before midnight. I wasn't making a point of staying up (I'm usually the one dozing off before the guitar falls) but there had been a poem I had been trying to write all month, so I buckled down to fleshing it out and hit the Submittable button forty minutes before midnight (and again at twenty minutes 'til for another packet). Then I put away laundry while peeking at the lights still up on my street and on Holly. A year ago the ones on Holly would not have been visible because of trees the tornado knocked down.
Tonight's dinner is leftover rice with black-eyed peas and Chinese sausage, with sparkling wine. It reached 74 F in parts of Nashville today, so I spent part of the afternoon cutting spotted leaves off the rosebushes, and tomorrow I'll spray them.
Friends, here's to a year with an abundance of roses and other rewards. And, if you aren't blogging or tweeting about your goings-on, drop me a line on what you are seeing, hearing, tasting, or considering? Message me for my address if you'd rather send (and get) a (post)card. :)
