dual personalities

This week I had the urge to cook. I started by making cranberry-pear chutney (i.e., cranberry sauce) from a recipe that my son’s fiancée shared with me. Though I halved the recipe, I still ended up with a vast quantity of sauce. I hope it freezes well. Then I tried my hand at making baguettes from scratch (okay, the bread machine mixed the dough but I did the rest), so we could eat the chutney with brie and bread. Although my bread did achieve a hard crust, the end shape was all wrong and the interior texture lacked the requisite air pockets (but I felt it wasn’t bad for a first effort).

Finally, I made this meatloaf recipe from Bon Apetite. The glaze is very nice, but if I make the meatloaf again, I will reduce the amount of breadcrumbs and broth and probably skip the bacon. I love bacon, but on meatloaf it just tends to add grease. So much for my efforts to amuse myself in the kitchen.

I spent the rest of my week reading Robert Galbraith’s (aka J.K. Rowling’s) 5th Cormoran Strike book which clocked in at a wildly bloated 945 pages! Will someone please assign Ms. Rowling a good editor?

I felt as if I were living the detection process in real time — and that is not a compliment. No reader needs to suffer through every interview, follow every lead, and be privy to every incidental conversation and cup of coffee. In addition to the main case, Rowling includes several minor side-cases, thus adding to the already excessive character list. On the plus-side, her two main characters remain appealing and consistent, albeit still mired in the same old family problems and will-they, won’t-they romantic tension. In that respect, the books are like a TV show that relies on the unfulfilled attraction between the main characters to keep its audience. Five books is a long time — too long IMHO — to keep such tension going. Ok, I’ll stop.

That’s about it for my week’s activities. I’m trying to get into the Christmas spirit but it is eluding me (you can tell by my grumpy book review). Echoing my DP and her daughters, I think I need to get back to fundamentals. I plan to return to the Bible and to the classic carols. Let’s start with Christina Rosetti’s “In the Bleak Midwinter” which seems especially appropriate for 2020:

In the bleak mid-winter
  Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
  Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
  Snow on snow,
In the bleak mid-winter
  Long ago.

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him
  Nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away
  When He comes to reign:
In the bleak mid-winter
  A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty,
  Jesus Christ.

Angels and archangels
  May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
  Thronged the air,
But His mother only
 In her maiden bliss,
Worshipped the Beloved
  With a kiss.

What can I give Him,
  Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
  I would bring a lamb,
If I were a wise man
  I would do my part,
Yet what I can I give Him,
  Give my heart.

I have always loved that poem/carol. It’s a good place to start.

Have a superb week filled with gratitude and joy!

Our sweet Katiebelle is six months old today! Can you believe it? I really cannot. Every growth spurt has felt pretty crazy to me — remember when she started doing tummy time in earnest? — but this most recent one feels particularly significant. She’s so big!

Katie loves to sit up, and even practices standing…

She is very aware of the world: who’s around the corner, what kind of music is playing, if the wind is blowing in her face, and so on. And she knows what she likes! (Soft music, yes; wind blowing in her face, no.) She gobbles down solids at lunchtime every day.

Still no teeth, even though we’re convinced every fussy moment is a sign of dental development (LOL). Yes, DN and I can be a little hyperactive when it comes to being parents. I blame the pandemic and spending pretty much every waking moment staring at Katie.

But can you really blame us?!

*Simon and Garfunkel, “The Only Living Boy in New York,” Katie’s favorite new song. DN and I like to give each other the babe-o report (the only news you need etc. etc.) if one of us has been doing something else.

Well, it’s December and I’ve descended into a Charlie Brown-esque funk.

Following the epic weekend of manual labor, I returned to my apartment and got my tree up and decorations out while Hallmark kept me company in the backgound. My tree is pretty and I love my festive things–but I am disappointed that there will be no parties this year.

And I guess it is the time of year when I pass this dish and think there’s candy in it only to be routinely disappointed that it is old light bulbs.

I don’t think the lack of candy is the root cause of my funk, surprising as that may be based on my usual blog content. I have gotten a truly revolting amount of emails promising extra deals and 60% off. Literal subject lines declared “Forget gifts, what can you get for yourself?” and I just feel like Charlie Brown. Too much commercialism. I’ll probably take my mother’s lead and read a chapter of Luke a day as a spiritual practice for Advent since the powers that be won’t let us go to church.

The only remedy is a little Bob Dylan. Or possibly a lot.

*Slow Train, Bob Dylan

Today we celebrate Thanksgiving and my nephew’s birthday (Happy Birthday, dear WRC!). I know that it’s Saturday and therefore not actually Thanksgiving, but we had to postpone so that we wouldn’t be alone. Son #1 arrives sometime later today to join his parents for the Big Meal which we’ll start preparing shortly. We had hoped son #3 and his girlfriend would make it, but they cannot come, so there will only be three of us.

This famous N.C. Wyeth painting got me thinking about those first hardy pilgrims. I know it’s not politically correct these days to appreciate the hard lives they led and how brave they were to venture over the ocean in little wooden ships, but they deserve to be celebrated. After all, they risked everything and they died in droves so that they could live free (and, yes, I know that there were indentured servants and a few slaves). But think about the challenges they faced!

Being thankful for the first settlers does not take anything away from Native Americans or anyone else. Nor is it meant to. When we study the past, we need to study all of it and take it on its own terms, both good and bad. I, for one, think those early settlers were amazing, and on the whole, set a great example for those who followed.

But back to the present! After our perfect meal, we’ll move seamlessly and quickly to Christmas decorating. We’ll whisk away all signs of Fall and turkeys and make the switch to Christmas. We don’t have much time because our son has to leave again on Sunday afternoon. I’m not complaining; I’m grateful that one of my sons can come home! That’s about it for this Saturday. I hope you’ll forgive the short post but I’ve got to get into the kitchen to make pie!

Happy Thanksgiving from Katiebelle! Here she is wearing her fancy holiday outfit.

Yesterday I had one of my routine breakdowns where I call my mother and sister in a fit of “I can’t take this anymore!” (This being trying to work and parent full-time in a 2-bedroom apartment with neighbors who seem to slow-cook broccoli for 8 hours a day). But really, once I release a little of that pent-up stress (and light a Christmas candle) it isn’t hard to remember that there is plenty be thankful for, and I think we all know who tops the gratitude list: our healthy, remarkable baby!

This popped into my head yesterday, and I hope it stays there…

A thankful heart is a happy heart!
Be glad for what we have,
That’s an easy way to start!
For the love that He shares,
‘Cause He listens to our prayers,
That’s why we say thanks every day!