Make It Make Sense!

Those of you who have followed my blog for any length of time know that this is a bit of a down year year out at work.  We haven't worked a single Saturday, and have barely worked any 9-10 hour shifts.  We've had several shutdowns, including three that were an entire week long -- one of those being just last week. 

Now that December is on us, and we only have two more weeks before another shutdown, this one being two weeks long, what does the plant do?  They make us work a Saturday.  Folks are not happy about that.   Two assembly lines have to work, and some component areas will also be working.  Supervisor came around asking for volunteers, and said if he didn't get enough, he'd have to make Saturday mandatory.  

I don't have to work, being that I have a vacation day already scheduled for tomorrow, but Supervisor came and asked me if I would come in anyway.  I told him no.  I said that if I didn't already have Friday off, I'd be there Saturday with bells on, but not this time. 

The echo of his voice asking people to come in Saturday hadn't even died away when....he sent half of the department home early.  

Those of us who were left were looking at each other in confusion, and one coworker put it perfectly when she said, "Make it make sense!"  But then, when has that place ever made sense?

Oh, and to make matters worse, Group Leader Shark was off today, so they had the one who used to be second shift group leader back when we had a second shift the group leader.  She was driving every one crazy trying to micromanage everything.  The parts stager even told her we don't need a babysitter on this shift, but she wouldn't let up.  By the end of the day, I was left wondering what she was so afraid of that she felt she needed to control everything around her. 

At long last, the day -- and my work week -- finally ended, and I came home hoping beyond hope that the cleared woods had been a figment of my imagination.  Alas, they were not. The land is definitely cleared, but it doesn't look like they've cleared any more since yesterday.  I don't know if it's because of the rain, or if they're done.  I'm hoping it's the latter, and they've stopped before they get to my part of the woods.  Just to be on the safe side, I moved the water trough and bowl inside the fence.  Once I see how far down they're coming, I might move it back, but it won't really matter.  The deer can just jump the fence anyway.  

I'm also hoping that they're expanding the campground across the highway instead of building houses.  Campers are fun;  neighbors not so much.  Campers come and camp and don't bother you, whereas neighbors look over your fence and complain that you're not mowing enough, or that you don't have enough flower beds or whatever.  

The other possibility is that they're expanding the cemetery that's just beside where they've cleared.  Dead people make great neighbors. 

I guess I'll just have to wait and see.  It does look like they're trying to leave a tree line, so that's what leads me to believe they're expanding the campground.  I don't think a neighborhood would care.

Oh, and an abrupt change of subject, remember the box I got Monday?  Well, I opened it after all.  I'd thought it was the gift my sister had ordered her daughter in law.  She'd told me they wouldn't send that gift to Alaska, so asked me if she could send it to me, and I'd mail it on to her.  So, after thinking about it a moment, I thought maybe that's what was in the box, so I opened it to check.  Turns out it wasn't.  It's something else.

The silver lining of having a memory like mine is that I can wrap it and put it under the tree, and by Christmas, I'll have forgotten what it is. 

Speaking of Christmas, all the gifts that need to go to Alaska have been ordered and are on their way.  Or at least in the queue to be shipped.  I was a bit bummed that the set of survival tools I wanted to get my sister's middle son couldn't be shipped to their address, so I had to pick something else from his wish list.  I'm not sure why.  The gift I picked for my oldest nephew's wife couldn't be shipped to a gift registry address, so I had it shipped to my sister's house.  Weird things happen when you try to send stuff to Alaska.  

You're never going to believe what I'm about to tell you.  I'm tired of eating.  Seriously.   Even though Cody and Bren took a lot of leftovers with them, I've been eating Thanksgiving leftovers for a week now, and I'm tired of them!  I still have a big old tub of turkey salad, so I took the rest of the meat and vacuum sealed most of it to put it into the freezer.  

But wait, there's more!  I still have to pick the meat from what I boiled the other day.  

And eat the rest of the cranberry sauce, and the pumpkin pie...

As if that weren't enough, they passed out the birthday cupcakes at work today.  Being as I have a November birthday, I got one.

The pie is going to have to wait.  I'm eating my cupcake. 

And finally, happy last day of Hurricane season!  For the second year in a row, I didn't have to light my Jim Cantore repelling candle not once.  

Done For Now

 Well, I guess I'm all done decorating for Christmas for this year.  I fiddled and fiddled with that last string of lights until I wore a hole in my thumb, but couldn't get it to work.  So I just took that single string on the far left down, and I'm leaving it at that. 

In other news, y'all thought I was joking when I said it was cold at my work area, but here is the evidence.  

Now let me clarify something first.  It's only cold in the winter time.  During the summer, it's still 95+.  But there is going to be a warming trend over the next few days.  Don't get me wrong, I love cold weather when I can sit home in front of the fire under a blanket drinking hot chocolate.  Having to stand there working in it, and with a fan blowing on me to boot, not so much. 

That's about all I have for you today.  I got home from work, and it looks like they're cutting down the woods behind my house, and I'm plumb sick about it.  I don't know what they're going to put there, but I hope it's not a new housing edition.  It probably will be, though.  

What's the point of moving out into the country if it doesn't stay country?  I guess I'd better go ahead and get that privacy fence built after all. 

This Cat

This cat of mine is going to be the death of me yet.  Don’t let her sweet and innocent look fool you. There is a reason I named her Evil Incarnate.

There I was in bed last night, relaxed, warm, and drowsy.  Just about to drop off, when the cat let out a blood curdling snarl that like to have made me jump out of my skin -- not to mention the bed.

I quickly got out of said nice, warm bed, ran to see what was going on, and found her looking out of the French doors with her tail all puffed up.  I calmed her down as best I could, but by then I was wide awake.  I eventually settled down and fell asleep, but the night was way too short for my liking.  

Well, they're all too short for my liking, but that's beside the point. 

I got to work, and baby it was cold at my stand.  OK, it was 63°, but my work requires a fan blowing on me all the time, which makes it feel so much colder.   I had my work shirt, a long sleeve flannel shirt, my jacket, a scarf, and a hat on, and I was still cold.  It eventually warmed up a bit, but I think I'm going to cast on a cowl for myself, because there was one tiny little space between my scarf and hat where the cold air was getting in.  

But while I was standing there freezing, I had the bright idea that if I come home and make a big old bowl of turkey salad with the leftovers, I can take that to work tomorrow and Thursday -- having taken a vacation day for Friday-- then I won't have to go to the store until my normal shopping day.  Which is Friday...

Speaking of, I got the carcass boiled down yesterday and have already put up 3 quarts of broth, with more still in the pot.  I'd let it cool for about an hour, and thought that was enough.  Apparently, it wasn't because  I managed to slop some hot broth onto my hand and burned my thumb, which caused me to utter an unwholesome word for which I had to repent.  Which I did do.  Repent, I mean.  

I ran over to the sink and ran cool water over my thumb, then put some burn get on it, and as of this writing, it's almost healed.  There is a little red spot, and it barely hurts, so that's good.  After that, I let the broth cool in the fridge until this morning, when I put some of it into empty, washed mayonnaise jars and put it into the freezer.  

I'll take care of the rest maybe tomorrow, because this afternoon, I finally got my outside lights put up.  Alas, one of my strings of lights didn't work, and no amount of fiddling and checking the bulbs would rectify that.  By that time, I was so knackered I said, "Forget this!"  and just put up the three working strings.  

I'm still not completely sold on having the white icicle lights with the colored lights on top, so this might be the last year I do that.  My across the street neighbor has multicolored icicle lights across the whole front of their house, so I might see if I can find some on clearance and go that route from here on out.  

Or I may just go back to the single line of solid colored lights.  I don't know.  Heck, I may even pull it all down and re-do it this year.  I don't know.  I'm too tired to think about it now, so I'll just leave you with this picture of my mantle.  

 And I'm going to go to bed early.  

Goodnight, peeps.  

Back To Work

If turning the alarm off at the beginning of your vacation is the best feeling in the world, then turning it back on at the end must surely be the worst.  

I woke up this morning wondering how on earth that week went by so fast, and it was cold at that. I did not want to get out of bed, but alas, I have no sugar daddy, so I pried my behind out of my nice warm bed, and out into the cold I went.  As if going back to work weren't enough, I decided to wear my new boots.  I'd been trying to break them in at home, but I didn't break them in enough.  

I'd planned on going to the store after work, but by the end of the day -- as I told my friend, "My feets hurt so bad I don't need anything from the store that can't wait until tomorrow."   I'd also planned on hanging my outside lights this afternoon, but that didn't happen either.  That's all I have left to do as far as decorating, having finished the tree yesterday. 

Instead, I came home and began pulling the rest of the meat off of my Thanksgiving turkey.  I've decided not to make more soup this year, because I've still got quite a bit left in the freezer from last year.  I'm going to use most of the meat to make turkey salad -- like chicken salad, but with turkey -- then boil the bones down to make sipping broth.  

Oh, and I got a lovely little thank you note from the Christmas At Sea people.  It really made my day!

Not uncoincidentally, today's Bible verse:  

And finally, a mysterious package arrived from Amazon, brought by UPS.  I don't remember ordering anything -- other than the storage box for my Christmas tree, but that's way bigger than this box, and isn't supposed to arrive until Saturday anyway.  

Hmmm, maybe it's a present.  Which is why I haven't opened it yet.  What if it is a present?  

Or what if it's just vitamins?  But those don't usually come by UPS...Whatever could it be? 

It's Going To Be OK

When I got up this morning, I got a wild hair up my hiney and decided that dadgummit, I would try to fix those Christmas tree lights after all.  I got my soldering iron and wire strippers and shrink wrap out and got to work.  However, I didn't get very far at all before I discovered the damage was much more extensive than I'd originally thought. 

The damaged string had been cut into at least six pieces.  Bummer.  There's no way I was going to try to figure all that out, so I did the only there was left to do.  I pulled the whole thing completely off the tree.  In doing so, I discovered that the strings plug in to a central system...I guess you'd call it. 

I'm going to try to find a website or something -- or contact customer service and see if I can buy a replacement string.  I'm pretty sure being eaten by rats isn't covered under manufacturer's warranty, but maybe they have them for purchase.  In the meantime, I filled in the space with some extra lights I had in storage.  

They won't blink or change to white, but I can live with that.  I prefer non-blinking multi-colored lights anyway, but it is nice to have the option to change things up every once in a while. 

In other news, remember I was talking the other day about an advent poster Cody and I used to do when he was little?  I decided to get it out and do it again this year.  

One of the sheep is missing, but as far as I remember, everything else is still there.  The most amazing thing is the little wad of Plasti-tak that came with it some 26-ish years ago is still pliable.  I think I'm going to replace it anyway next time I go into town.  Or at least get some extra.  If I remember right, I always had to pull a bit off of the pictures we'd already added to have enough to finish up.  But that's neither here nor there...

It's got a little devotional book that goes with it that tells you which picture to add, and a Bible verse to read.  When we used to do this way back in the day, we'd also sing a Christmas carol related to the picture that was added that day.  It was really quite funny, because one of the carols I chose was Lo, How A Rose Ere Blooming, and I had no idea how it was supposed to go -- tune wise, I meant.  I had a hymnal with the words, but we kind of had to make up a tune.  This was before YouTube, and I don't think I'd ever heard it sung before. 

When we finally got a computer and YouTube became a thing, I looked the song up.  Oh, so that's how it goes. 

I can neither confirm nor deny that what we were singing bore absolutely no resemblance to this hymn.

And finally, I have it on good authority that the first batch of Christmas cards I sent out has begun arriving.  I know this because the recipient messaged me and let me know he got it.  The last batch went into the mail yesterday, so you should all be getting yours within a week or so.  If you don't get one, it's because I didn't have your address.  I've still got plenty of cards, so if you'd like to be added to my card list, please message me your info, and I'll be happy to get one out to you.  

Now if you'll be so kind as to excuse me, I need to start hanging ornaments on this here Christmas tree.  

Laters

Found One!

Good news!  After I posted yesterday, I went on over to Amazon to see what kind of storage containers I could find, and came up with this one. 

 

I promptly ordered it, then panicked and canceled the order because I didn't think it would be big enough for my tree.  Then I thought better of it, and went out to the shed and measured the original box my Christmas tree came in.  It was actually smaller than this box, so I re-ordered it.   

Sorry Amazon, you must think I'm one of those squirrels darting back and forth in the road. 

It was marked down for Black Friday, and is made of heavy duty resin, so that should discourage critters from chewing on it.  Also, according to the product page, it's sturdy enough to sit on, so I can stack some of my other boxes on top of it to keep things from getting inside.  And by things, I mean rats.  Or squirrels.  But probably rats. Whatever, I feel much better now that I'll have something sturdy to store my tree in. 

Even more good news, while I was over there, I saw that the cat's flea and tick stuff was marked down from $69 to $48.  Naturally, I couldn't pass that deal up.  

And the best news, I found a couple of old blog posts that had photos of all my Christmas decorations, so I knew where to put stuff!  That's what I spent most of today doing.

Why yes, yes I do have two football games on at the same time.  This should come as no surprise to anyone who knows me even a little bit. But I digress...

Once I got everything out -- well, what I've done so far -- I took photos and uploaded them to a private FB album so next year, I won't have to go through all this stress of not knowing where to put stuff. 

You're not going to believe it, but after all that ruckus I raised, I actually did a couple of things differently this year.  I usually put this little nativity back in the kids' room, but this time, I decided to put it into my kitchen windowsill, along with that Santa thing I bought because it's cute, but don't really have a place for it. 

Kindly ignore my uncleaned windows.  I've put that onto the chore list.  But it's not happening tonight.  Oh, and those are not mouse poopies on the window sill.  They're apple seeds.  I thought I might try to plant them in the spring and just see what I come up with.  

The other thing I did was switch this up a bit.  Usually, I put a bunch of the green garland around all this stuff, but I felt it was a bit much, so this year I just put a few pine picks there instead.

I like the way it looks like that. 

I still have to put up my outside lights and decorate the tree, but other than that, I'm done.  I need to drag the tree out into the center of the room and finish fluffing the branches, then fill in the dead spot with extra lights before I can start decorating it.  I'll do all that tomorrow.  

For now, I've got more football to watch.  The Iron Bowl was wild, man!  My three favorite rivalry games which I'm not a fan of either team are Bedlam (I hate that it's ending), the Egg Bowl, and the Iron Bowl.  Of course, we all know the absolute best rivalry game is Army-Navy.  That's why it's the only game shown that day.  

Speaking of the Navy, let me leave you with this, just to brighten your day. 

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got football to watch.  

Oh, and before I forget, the local high school football team will be playing for the state championship next Friday.  I told Cody, and he was like, "Really?!"  Back when he was in high school, they usually only won 1 or 2 games a year, so they've come a long way since his day.  

Now, I'm outta here, for reals this time. 

Can't Catch A Break

I don't do Black Friday.  I never have.  Even when we were kids, the day after Thanksgiving was for baking homemade fruitcakes, not shopping.  

We were talking about it yesterday when the kids were here, how Black Friday seems to be dying down a bit -- at least the 4:00AM doorbuster specials are.  I haven't seen them advertised in a while, and Bren mentioned that stores are spreading the Black Friday sales out over the entire month.  That, combined with the increase in online shopping...oh, I'm sure there are still mobs of shoppers, but it's not as bad as it was 10ish or so years ago. 

For me, Friday is for taking down my Fall decorations and putting up my Christmas decorations, and that's what I did, or rather started doing, today.  I said I wasn't going to be in a hurry to get anything done, and I'd just take things at my own pace.  But between cheesy Hallmark movies and football, I made a pretty good start. 

Let me just step outside my story for a moment to tell you that I'm beginning to understand why my maternal grandparents didn't decorate much.  They only had a three foot tree, and as a kid, I wondered why they didn't go all out for Christmas.  Now, I know.  The finished product is so nice, but it's an awful lot of work when you're doing it by yourself.  

Now back to your regularly scheduled blog post...

I got all my Fall stuff down and packed away with no problem, but as I was putting it back into the shed, I noticed something had chewed off a corner of my Christmas tree box.  

I was hoping beyond hope that whatever it was -- I suspect a rat-- had only chewed the box and left the actual tree alone, but alas it was not to be.  I quickly spied right in front of that blue tub one of the lights.  It had been completely chewed off. 

"Oh no!"  I wailed in despair as I threw my hands in the air and wept uncontrollably, "Christmas is ruined!  It's RUINED!"  

Ok, I didn't get quite that dramatic, but I did waffle back and forth between throwing the whole tree away and buying a new one and just not putting up a tree at all.  After talking myself off the ledge, I brought the tree inside anyway, and plugged it in just to see if any of the lights would work, and wonder of wonders, most of them did. 

Once I got the whole tree up and turned on, it's not that noticeable.  

It's just that one little space that's out, and I'm pretty sure I have extra lights I can fill it in with.  Truth be told, I never really liked that tree anyway.  The display in the store looked a whole lot better than the one I pulled out of the box.  I was pretty disappointed, because it's from Lowe's and supposed to be a good quality tree.  The ones I'd bought from Walmart looked better than this one.  I kinda wish I'd kept the one Beverly and James gave me when they moved back to Texas.  It was a gorgeous tree, but was way too big for my little living room.  There is no way it would fit in there with my piano in the room now.   I bought this one specifically to have a smaller tree, and it's still a tight fit.  

Still, this is my fourth Christmas with this tree, and once I get it all fluffed and decorated it'll look a bit better.  That will all take place tomorrow, though, and maybe in a year or two, I'll give this one away and get a new one.  In the meantime, I wrapped some electrical tape around the ends of the chewed off wires, just to be on the safe side, and I'll need to spend the next month trying to find a more secure way to store it.  I'm thinking if I can get one of those Rubbermaid type closets without the shelves, I can put the tree and my wreaths into it and they'll be safe there.  

By the way, I debated on trying to fix the broken wires, by stripping the insulations, soldering the wires together and sealing them with shrink wrap, but I didn't want to fool with it.  I may try that after Christmas, but I'm leaving it for now.  

As if all that weren't enough, I'm such a dingbat I can't remember where I put my decorations from year to year, so I take pictures of where my stuff goes.  I'm not one of those people who can do something different every year.  The problem is, I can't find where my photos are.  I was sure I'd uploaded them to a private album on FB, but apparently I didn't.  So, now I'm stressing out because I'm overwhelmed with all these decorations, and I don't know where to put anything.  

My day wasn't a total loss, though.  I got happy mail!  My new candles from my friend Kristine's shop arrived today!  

I wasn't expecting them until Monday, so this was a nice surprise.  

You know what...after all that, I think a piece of pumpkin pie is in order.

Laters.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, another Thanksgiving has come and gone, and even though it was just me, I still cooked my traditional Thanksgiving dinner. 

Yes, I even got my gravy boat out.  Because I deserve gravy in a gravy boat, by golly!  The downside to that is, I used the little packet of McCormick gravy mix that I got with my free Ibotta meal, and...let's just say, my homemade gravy is better.  I mean, it wasn't bad gravy.  It just wasn't great gravy.  I did chop up my little giblets and add them to it, but still...

On the other hand, I was pleasantly surprised by that whole berry cranberry sauce.  I don't normally like cranberry stuff, but that was pretty good.  For canned stuff, I mean.  It had a sweetness to it that counterbalanced the tartness from the cranberries, so I really liked it.  

By the way, I did stuff the turkey with apple slices, but frankly, I can't really tell that they made a difference in how moist the meat was.  The good news is, I only needed two of them to fill the turkey, so there are plenty enough for the deer.  Or whatever it is that is eating them.

Oh, and the meat thermometer worked pretty well.  The probe itself worked fine, but the app needs improvements.  At one point, it lost connection with the probe, and I couldn't figure out how to get the alarm to shut up.  I had to exit the app and start completely over, because when I tried to reconnect, it just took me to the help screen -- which all that did was explain why the probe might lose connection, but it didn't turn off the alarm.  I finally had to take the turkey completely out of the oven and stand right beside it with my phone to get the probe to reconnect to the app.  

Other than that, it worked a treat.  Just to be on the safe side, when the turkey was done, I double checked with my old fashioned meat thermometer and the probe was on point.  I may practice with it a few more times during the year, mostly to figure the app out, but it was so much more convenient than  constantly having to open the oven to check.  

And the pop up timer never did pop up...

All in all, it was good Thanksgiving.  I watched the parade, 

and yes, I still teared up a bit when Santa Claus entered Harald Square. 

I watched Miracle On 34th Street -- it's tradition -- then settled in to watch football for the rest of the day.  

The kids stopped by to visit a bit on their way back to Jackson, and took a bunch of leftovers with them --including the entire broccoli casserole.  When Cody was cutting some of the turkey off, Brennan tasted it and said, "oooo", so I guess she thought it was pretty good.  She said the one her cousin brought was a bit dry, which is surprising because the one he brought last year was so good.  He'd stuffed it with oranges and rosemary, which I was going to try myself this year, but I'd already cut my rosemary back pretty hard, and had all those apples already.  Maybe next year. 

She loved her Advent Calendar, by the way.  They brought Finley with them, so I got to meet him.  Since my crank pot cat was outside, we just let him go wherever he wanted and naturally, he went where he shouldn't have gone.  I had to chase him off of my kitchen cabinet and away from my breakables a few times, but overall, he was a good kitty. 

As another Thanksgiving draws to a close, for your final Thanksvember, I am thankful for family, and for the memories of Thanksgiving past and present.  Good times and not so good.  Thanksgiving is what you make of it, and there is always something to be thankful for. 

Now, before I go, it just wouldn't be Thanksgiving without the greatest Thanksgiving show ever in the whole history of the universe.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!!

All Done

I woke up bright and early this morning with a cat yowling outside my bedroom door.  Not quite ready to get out of bed, I let her in and got back into bed.  Where I was as very quickly joined by the aforementioned yowling cat. 

Needless to say, I didn't get back to sleep.  Probably just as well, because I had quite a to-do list to get through. 

The first thing I did was to finish with the Christmas cards, and I'm pleased to report they've all been addressed and the first batch is already winging their way to their intended recipients.  I'm sending 48 this year, so I'm mailing the in batches so as to not overwhelm my mail carrier.  I considered driving into town and mailing them all at the post office, but didn't really want to get dressed.  Maybe I'll run them in Friday or Saturday, or maybe I won't.  Eh, I'll get them mailed eventually.  

On a slightly related note, look what I found.

The top card is my sister and her family.  Her oldest boy is the one who got married in August.  The bottom card is from my aunt and uncle -- my dad's oldest sister and her husband.  I have a hard time tossing old Christmas cards out, especially if they're photo cards like these. 

OK, back to my list.  The next thing I did was to make the first layer of my aunt's strawberry Jell-o salad.  So to speak.  Now, if you'll look in my right sidebar, you'll see a link to a post with a strawberry Jell-o salad recipe.  That is my aunt's recipe, but I've adapted it a bit.  The main thing I did was double it, because it's so popular, and I leave out the pineapple.  Oh, and I use fresh strawberries, not frozen. 

Other than that, it's my aunt's recipe.  

Once that was done and gelling in the fridge, I put together the broccoli casserole, because it's the most labor intensive.  One thing, I've never been able to cut an onion.  Naturally, I did what any red blooded American would do.  I looked up a Gordon Ramsay video on YouTube.  Man, he made it look so easy!

He was over there saying, "Cut the onion like this."  and I was over here saying, "Slow down!"  I kept having to pause the video, but in the end I did a pretty good job of cutting that onion.  Much better than I usually do.  The trick will be remembering how to do it next time.  Or I'll just have to look up the video again.  

Then I brined the turkey and made two pies and wonder of wonders, found room in the fridge for all of it.   Needless to say, between onion skins, bits of celery, banana peels, and strawberry tops, my composter got a good feed today.  

I think tomorrow when I cook the turkey, I'm going to stuff the cavity with some of those apples I'd originally bought for the deer.  Someone on Facebook had posted a meme basically asking what advice older cooks would give to someone cooking a turkey for the first time.  My advice was to not trust the pop-up timer, but get a good meat thermometer and use it.  Several people mentioned stuffing the cavity with apples to keep the turkey moist, so I decided to try it.  

I'm going to google some recipes as soon as I get off of here, which I should probably wrap this up and get busy, but before I go, here is your Thanksvember Twenty -second:  I'm thankful for those friends from my childhood who stuck with me, even though at one time, I was an obnoxious little not-nice person.  

And I'm thankful for the friends I made when I got older who helped me see how obnoxious I could be, and made me realize I don't want to be that way.  I still don't have great people skills, but hey, I'm a whole lot better than I used to be.

Christmas Wishes

Guess what I got!!

I have always wanted to get an advent calendar, but for some reason, I never did.  I mean, when Cody was little, we had an Advent calendar, but it was the kind you stick figures onto a background to make a nativity scene.  In fact, I think I'll get that one back out and do it this year, even though we lost one of the sheep.  

No, what I'm talking about is the kind where you open the little door each day and get a treat.  I've always wanted to do one of those, so this year, I said, "Dadgummit!  I'm going to get me an Advent calendar!"  And that's exactly what I did. 

While I was at it, I got some for Cody and Brennan, too.  The chocolate ones are for me and Cody, and the one with the little gemstones is for Brennan, because she is a rock hound.  I haven't told them, but I told Cody they need to stop by on their way home from Brennan's parents house.  

In other news, all of those dishes and things have finally been washed and sanitized and put away.  Except for a few things I'm going to need for Thanksgiving, of course.  I left those out for convenience sake.  I'm getting too old to be crawling under the cabinets, and I had enough of that getting it all back out...and back in.

What took so long was actually the drying time.  The washing went pretty quickly, but then I had to dry the stuff.  My two options were to let them air dry for several hours, or dry them with my dish towels -- which quickly became too soaked to be effective.  Thus...I had to let them -- meaning the towels -- dry for several hours.  I went with a combination of the two, and eventually we got 'er done. 

I even managed to part with a few things I seldom use any more, or that need replacing anyway. 

Well, technically I haven't parted with them yet, but they are in the give away box.  I'm a bit torn on my grease keeper.  I mean, I haven't used it in ages, but every Southern home needs a grease keeper.  I'm afraid if I give mine away, I'll lose my Southern card.  I still have a biscuit cutter, though.  For now, at least.  I'm also going to go through my drawers and see what I can git rid of from those.  Some of what I'm giving away is stuff I need to replace -- like the round baking pans.  I've added them to my Amazon Christmas list in hopes one of my sibs will get them for me.  The rest of it is stuff I haven't used in so long I'd forgotten I even had it.  

Speaking of, I had a little chat with my sister this morning.  She wants to order something for her daughter in law, only they don't ship to Alaska.  Not sure why, but that's what she said.   Sis is going to have the item shipped to my house, and I'll forward it up to them in Fairbanks.  

Then we got to talking about our Christmas lists.  I always want to order their stuff kind of early, because I've had problems with getting stuff shipped to Alaska in the past.   Then she asked me if my list was ready, and I had to tell her to wait a bit.  I've gotten to the age where I don't even know what I want any more.  I mean, I already have enough stuff, and if there's anything I need, I tend to buy it myself. 

For example, I'd intended to ask for gift cards this year so I could buy my compost tumbler, but then they had a deal on it for Prime Days, so I got it myself.  

Thus, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what to even ask for.   Which brings me to Thanksvember Twenty-first:  I'm thankful to live in a country in a time of such abundance.  A country where we have so much, most of us don't even appreciate it.  

And today, you get a bonus Thanksvember, because we got (according to my weather app) almost 2" of rain yesterday, and though several parts of the state had tornadoes, no deaths have been reported.  At least, not to my knowledge.  

So, after I finished with the dishes, I moved some of my firewood up closer to the house, and not just for convenience sake.  

The overhang from the roof, plus that chimney stack will help protect it from the rain. And I've started moving some of it back into the old chicken coops, too.  That way, I'll have dry wood no matter how hard it rains. 

Finally, look at this.  It would seem when I repotted my Whatever cacti, I got them mixed up, and now I have all three colors in the same pot -- red, salmon, and the cream colored one. 

Now the great debate is whether to separate them next summer, or just leave them the way they are.  Oh, sell, I've got six months to decide.  

That's about all I have for today.  I'm off to try to find a Thanksgiving movie that isn't Planes, Trains, And Automobiles -- which I've already watched.  There really aren't that many to choose from, so I'm open to suggestions. 

Thanksgiving Prep

I started my Thanksgiving prep this morning, but it's not what you're thinking.  Let me start from the beginning. 

We're expecting the possibility of  severe weather this afternoon into the overnight hours -- see, I even sound like a meteorologist-- so first thing I did was move my plants into their winter home. 

I'll move them back outside on warm days, but for the most part, this is where they'll be until spring.  

Ignore the cardboard boxes.  I'll toss them eventually.  But they're really good boxes, so I might ought to save them...

Once that was done, I started my Thanksgiving prep, but not food prep.  No, the prep I started involved dragging all the pots and pans and various and sundry dishes out of the cabinets under my bar and sink.  

Truthfully, I've been meaning to do this for a while, and since we're off this week, I figured it would be the perfect time to get started.  And it'll keep me from making all my Thanksgiving food too early.  So, I dragged everything out and set it up on top of the counter.

Then I wiped down and sanitized the shelves, and while they were empty, I took a good look to try to find where these dadgum mice keep getting in.  I know that back wall isn't in the greatest shape, but I didn't see any obvious holes anywhere -- I mean, except for where the drain is, and I've got steel wool stuffed into that one.  

However they're getting in, it's got to be behind that dishwasher. 

Speaking of, I figured out why my dishwasher isn't working right any more.  I found a hose that had come detached, but I couldn't figure out where it was supposed to be hooked up.  Somewhere inside the inner workings of the dishwasher, I reckon.  Oh well, it wasn't that great of a dishwasher, and I want to get it replaced eventually anyway.  

When I get it replaced, I'll ask the installer to let me clean up really well before he puts the new dishwasher in, and maybe I can find where the mice are getting in then.  In the meantime, I tossed some mouse poison back there, and put a jug of water in front of that space so the cat couldn't get ahold of it and poison herself. 

Once it got everything as clean as I could get it and disinfected, I started laying down some shelf liner -- removing the cat as necessary -- I'd bought way back when I first moved into this house, but had never used. 

Man, I tossed out an astounding number of old jars and bottles I'd saved for who knows what reason.  Pickle jars, cheese dip jars, YooHoo bottles and the like.  Because I might need them some day.  But I won't, so I chunked them.  Yay me!

It looks so much better now, so long as you ignore my baseboards.  I want to get my entire kitchen remodeled, and when I do, all this will be replaced with new cabinets, fixtures, everything.  That's going to be a minute, though, because it costs money to do stuff, and that's something I don't have right now. 

With the cabinet under the sink as good as it's going to get for the time being, I moved on to the ones under the bar.  I ran into a slight snag when I ran out of shelf liner, but a quick trip to Walmart resolved that issue.  If any trip to Walmart can be quick.  

I'd thought about just going to the dollar store on the corner, but I also needed more deer corn, so to Walmart I went.   It was pretty crowded, which is understandable for it being a holiday week, but the biggest issue was the numpty in the checkout line in front of me.  She was there, with her groceries already partially loaded onto the conveyor, checking her bank balance on her phone to see if she had enough money to buy what she had in her buggy.  

Um, shouldn't you have done that before you left the house? 

Finally determining that she did indeed have enough money to make her purchase, she began loading her the rest of her groceries onto the conveyor, but for some reason, she wasn't putting them in the big empty space at the front of the conveyor.  She started about halfway down and kept piling them up where my six little items were.  I don't know why I didn't film it and put it up on People of Walmart.  I guess because I didn't think of it until just now.  

Anyway, she finally got finished, and I finally got finished, then made it home and put liner on the rest of my shelves.  

Now, I just have to start washing and sanitizing that huge mound of dishes, so I can put them all away. 

Which brings me to Thanksvember Twentieth:  I'm thankful for running water, bleach, and modern sanitation practices.    I'd hate to have to be scrubbing all that with sand and twigs.  

Well, I guess I'd better get to it...

First Fire

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a bit of a weather geek.  This is why I was stressing so badly about the firewood, because every model I've see and every meteorologist and chaser I follow have said it's going to be a cold and snowy winter this year.   

I am so glad the firewood guy came through, because other than the wood I already had inside, 

this was all I had left.  

I didn't know what I'd do if the power went out during a cold spell. I guess I'd be scrounging for windfall out in the woods behind the house.  Now that I have firewood, it really is a load off of my mind.  My overthinking, worst-case-scenario thinking mind can now rest a bit easier. 

All my weather apps had been saying the lows were supposed to be in the low 40s last night, so I brought my outside plants inside, just to be on the safe side. 

Good thing I did, because my thermometer on my back porch said 34 when I got up.  They probably would have survived, but why take chances?  I think one of my projects for the week is to clean up the plant shelf I have outside and get my Whatever cacti settled in for the winter.  

Right now, they're sitting on the deep freeze in my utility room, and that's not a good spot for them.  I've read that moving them can cause them to drop their buds, so I want to get them in their winter home and not have to move them every time need to get into my deep freeze.  I've read that moving them can cause the to drop their buds, and I don't want that to happen.

All that to say, it was cold this morning when I got up, so I indulged myself with a little fire in the box -- the first one of the season.  By lunch time, it had warmed up enough I let the fire die down, but it was so cozy while it lasted.  

The cold weather and the warm fire put me in the mood to get started doing my Christmas cards. 

I'm doing something a little different this year, because I've been told the wax seals are getting ripped off the envelopes by our wonderful postal system.  To prevent that, I'm using stickers to decorate the envelopes instead.  They're still cute...and the wax seals are still there.  They're just on the inside this time around.  

I still have quite a few to go, but I hope to get the last of them into the mail by this weekend.  

In the midst of all that, I managed to cast on another hat.  

Now, I'm off to watch a cheesy Great American Family Christmas movie and knit some more, and maybe address a few more cards.  Oh, and the turkey is already in the fridge and Thanksgiving prep starts tomorrow!  

Oh, before I forget!  Thanksvember Nineteenth:  For the last few months, the radio in my car has been popping and crackling.  Not like regular static, but like something was interfering with the signal.  At first, I thought it was picking up a stray bluetooth signal or something, so I turned off the bluetooth.  It kept happening, so I just turned the whole sound system off completely and listened to silence for a few days....but it still kept happening.  Just not as much, but even with the radio turned off, I'd occasionally hear the pop and sizzle of...whatever it was.  I was on the verge of taking the car into the shop, because I thought my speakers were going out.  Maybe it was a loose wire, or so I thought.  

Then one day last week as I was driving home from work, it occurred to me I still had my Walkman MP3 player plugged in.  As soon as I got to a stopping place, I reached into the center console and unplugged it -- USB cable and all.  

It's been a week, and so far so good!  I'm thankful it wasn't the speakers after all, and I'm thankful I figured it out before calling the shop and making a fool out of myself.  

I'm thinking the USB cable might have come slightly loose from the car's vibrations, so it was like having a loose wire.  I haven't gotten brave enough to plug it back in yet, but I will.

Soon. 

I'll let you know how it goes. 

Firewood!

 He came! The firewood guy came!  Look at all this wood!  

And it's three rows deep, too!

And that brings us to Thanksvember Eighteenth:  I was going to put that I was thankful for the wood, but after thinking a moment, I changed my mind.  Today, I'm thankful for small business owners who show up when they say they are going to, and actually DO the job you've hired them to.  That's so rare around here... 

I apologize for the less than wonderful photos.  I got so excited that I went out and took them as soon as he left -- when it was already full dark.  I went back out this morning as soon as the sun was up and took another one.

Of course, I forgot about the morning mist, so I'm not sure if this one is really any better.  Look at this.  I didn't see it last night, but see how small he split the wood?  Hand included for scale. 

The other guy I used to buy from left the wood in huge chunks, so I'd have to split it myself just to fit it into my wood stove.  Now, there are some larger pieces in the stack, but most of it looks like this.  Just one thing, though.  I'm going to have to find a better place to hang this bird feeder. 

When I was 20, I wouldn't have had any problem climbing back there to get it and refill it.  Now that I'm 59...not as confident about my climbing skills.  This was only temporary anyway, until I can get the post reset.  A few more good rains like we had yesterday, and the ground just might get soft enough to dig it.  And yesterday's rain was just what we need here -- a long, slow drizzly rain all day long that gave it time to soak into the ground, and not just run off.  I'm not sure how much we got in inches, but like I said, at this point, we need every drop we can get. 

In other news, I have a bit of a crisis here in the Fine Martial Household.  I realized when I was unloading the last of my groceries that I'd accidentally bought whole berry cranberry sauce instead the jelly.  You know, the kind that comes out looking like the can.

That's what I'd intended to buy with my free Ibotta Thanksgiving deal, but I didn't check the can before I grabbed it.  I just scanned the bar code to see if it was the right deal.  

And ended up with this.  Oh, well.  I guess I don't need to make it now.  

But it's so much fun listening to the berries pop...I may still figure out a way to try to zhuzh it up a bit, but that's not quite the same as making it. 

And finally, I finished another hat this morning while I was avoiding cleaning up the kitchen.

Now that it's done, I guess I'd better start on that kitchen cleaning thing...