Yes, we cooked a turkey, but not in a trunk; we cooked it in a bag we got at the last moment. And we cooked a turkey in a last minute bag because when I got to Fairborn, I opened my trunk and realized I still had a 13 pound turkey in it. And it was starting to thaw. It had been sitting in the trunk in Kendallville at 21 degrees for a couple of days.
We had planned an unconventional Thanksgiving graze-a-thon, and we followed that plan, but we also had a cooked turkey, so we made some mashed potatoes and got more conventional. We also listened to “Come All Ye Faithful” on my iphone – a bit of tradition and technology.
Then we decorated an alpine tree in regular ornaments, cow ornaments, sock monkeys and a set of Mother’s old measuring spoons.
This morning, starting at five, I began dropping people off; the last one was at 7:30. In about 15 minutes I will leave to start picking them up. I am cleaner on the pick-up trip, but that’s about the only difference.
I have been packing the car for a trip to the Ohio Redoubt, though. Actually, I leave it mostly packed so it’s ready for LaGrange, Ohio, and Kendallville. I think I have started to forget just what is packed where and may have to do an inventory soon – just not in Ohio – that’s an upstairs apartment. Since we have a balcony and the ground floor people only have patio slabs with no fencing, I don’t mind the stairs . . . that much.
I am taking garland and a wreath and lights and I believe I have cleared this with Der Bingle. I am not putting an inflatable on the balcony. Just thought I’d mention it in case you were worried.
Now, tomorrow is the test to see if Google sends me on the “winter road route” and avoids the narrow county roads that aren’t wide enough for a middle line. That will send me through Van Wert, which I haven’t seen since early spring. It’s an old Ohio town and there are some stately houses on my route, which may be sporting classy decorations for the holidays. You can see the Dutch influence in a lot of the architecture, especially in the farmhouses that dot some very flat land. FLAT, FLAT AND FLAT.
Van Wert is after the windmill fields, which are impressive and, in my opinion, not an eyesore at all. In the dark, each has a red light and the whole lower sky seems to twinkle.
Do I know where my car keys are? I changed my clothes and took them out of my pocket. Okay, going to try my luck here.
Saturday morning the roads were dry, but there was talk of snow having hit Iowa and moving across Illinois and, gee, about 11am, big flakes started to come down. They stuck to everything; then the wind picked up and the snow got finer, but it stayed wet and heavy and the temperature was at 32/33 all day. And then we were under a winter weather storm warning. Roads glazed and the branches bent so low in front of the front door, they were at my eye level and I’m short.
You take a look at that and fill your cheeks with air and just blow it out slowly in resignation and go and get a broom to knock the flakes off. As it turned out, those flakes were globs, super-glued on branches and they weren’t moving. This morning I took a heavy rake and attacked them and enough snow came off that they lifted high enough for me to be able to walk under them – which I did not do.
The trunk latch on the car popped open when I pushed the release button, but the weight of the snow on the trunk held it down; I had to shovel the trunk – not just brush it off. We had a very warm fall, but now we have been smacked in the face and it does wake you up.
I snapped a picture and sent it to Der Bingle and he texted back: So Currier and Ives. I had not thought of it that way.
It is not because of the snow that I have not posted; nor it not because I have been cleaning and toting firewood in and hunting down mittens. It is just a lull for me. Why I don’t know; it seems when I am doing chores, a lot of stories go through my head, but apparently they are not reaching my fingers.
Speaking of fingers, I’d better find those mittens and dig out that frozen turkey so it can do its thawing out thing. Like I really want to stick my hand in a cold orifice looking for things like gizzards.
That really inspired me; maybe it’s time for a blanket over my head and some meditation.
I took a spectacular tumble this morning, launching ice, sandwich and myself into the air while walking on the porch. The ice and sandwich impacted and ricocheted; I just impacted, with the brunt on my knee. This is the paragraph with which I am starting “Take Two.”
The “Take One” post started with the following;
I’m 67, political incorrectness can fall out of my mouth as easily as the crumbs from a powdered sugar doughnut. Added to my age is my tendency to pun, joke, all right – outright mock. Not that the the above that are meant to be derogatory, but the word play has an irresistible humor, sort of.
I certainly see no humor in the spate of terrorist attacks, but I still tumble into the pitfall of letting anything set me off-balance concerning straight-faced, somber subjects.
Then I went on to relate various possible terrorist scenarios regarding my fall that popped into my head. Well, rats, I suppose it would have been okay for someone right there, listening at the moment, to hear it; but in writing it does seem not a little over the top, but somewhat under the bottom.
So, I am not including it. Do you know how hard that is for a person who used to write a series of stories about a really odd and crazy family called The Wickhams for a newspaper? Delete my words, Oh, horrors. However, I must say this is not in the same category as boys playing ball with the spongy jell-o salad Aunt Opal made for every family reunion. So, when it comes to ending the post, I’m taking a knee. No, I’m not; I hurt it. Hmmmm:
I guess what is usually said now is: Ya shoulda been there.
Everyone knows that Foo likes to keep things upbeat at her bar and so, with holiday season coming on, she has been screening Christmas songs – trying them out on the regulars. It hasn’t been working out too well. She included two versions of “I’ll be Home for Christmas”: Bing Crosby and The Irish Tenors, but not consecutively. She started off with Bing and some people were feeling a little nostalgic for those who wouldn’t be making it home in person; then she moved on to “The Littlest Angel”, again by Crosby.
Not a good idea; read the lyrics.
Let me tell you a tale that is often told
In the great Celestial Hall
All about an angel only four years old
The littlest angel of all
How all day he would play with a little box
That to others had no words
Oh, but there were treasures in this little box
The treasures he brought from Earth
Just a butterfly with golden wings
A little piece of a hollow log
Two shiny stones from a river bank
And the worn out strap of his faithful dog
Then the angels all heard that the holy child
Would be born in Bethlehem
And they all brought present for the holy child
And each gift was a heavenly gem
Then the littlest angel put his little box
With the presents fine and wrapped
And the littlest angel sat alone and cried
For his gift was so meager and sad
Just a butterfly with golden wings
A little piece of a hollow log
Two shiny stones from a river bank
And the worn out strap of his faithful dog
But the Lord chose the gift of the little box
That the child had blessed with love
And it started glowing that very night
It became the star up above
When you see that star as it shines on high
In the great Celestial Hall
You will know the proudest angel in the sky
Is the littlest angel of all
With his butterfly with golden wings
A little piece of a hollow log
Two shiny stones from a river bank
And the worn out strap of his faithful dog
(We got these lyrics and songlyrics.com, and if you really want the full impact, you can find it on YouTube.
Then “Fairytale of New York” came up, followed by the same Irish Tenors reprising “I’ll be Home for Christmas.”
People were sobbing, the kind of sobbing that involves snorts and gasps lots of nose blowing. Yes, it was a new kind of festive. Of course, after all those tears, a lot of stress was released and I suppose some of the patrons felt better, but, gee, I don’t think that is exactly a Deck the Halls type of gaiety.
She’ll be reworking the list, maybe going more Rudolph and Frosty and, of course, this upbeat tune:
I have been on a cleaning frenzy, which abated today. How can I run the dryer so much and still be left with wet blankets? Don’t worry if that seems an odd combination of sentences: it makes perfect sense to me.
Today would have been Daddy’s 97th birthday. I planned on spending some time up at the Lagrange House and, while waiting for my headlight to be replaced, received a text that the power was out in the area due to high winds. Well, I texted back, I was up for an adventure. I think I was there ten minutes when the power came back on – long enough to light some oil lamps and a candle.
It was quite a blow and getting the car door closed was not the easiest thing. I had thought about starting a fire in the kitchen cast iron stove, but decided that was not the best idea, so I turned the gas wall heater up higher than Mother usually did – maybe a lot higher. (Mother always thought the pilot light heating level was adequate at night)
I’ve got a lot of books to inventory, but I decided to read in one of them. Then I got a call that I needed to get back to Kendallville and on the way, I saw crews out sawing up toppled trees. Up to this point, the wind has not brought down the walnut tree that a microburst lifted up about 10 years ago. It has been leaning at between 1:30 and 2 clockface time.
I think I originally meant to write about my father, but I guess I’ve probably said most of what there is to say in many earlier posts. But I feel it all the time, and today, in the house, with the books and the flickering kerosene lamps and the radiant gas fire, it was like being home together.
Oh, the Pershing is after General Pershing because he was born on the day after the Armistice.
Der Bingle has said over the decades that I have always been a little ahead of trends – even to the point of adding the suffix “oid” to unlikely nouns before the first factoid appeared. Well, I have always like nutcrackers, scarfing them up at GoodWill and Rummage Sales for bargain prices. Glenda, my first cousin, who doesn’t have a AmeliaJake-type code name – but may want one – also is a nutcracker aficionado.
Now, i see nutcrackers in Crate & Barrel catalogues and on store shelves – all sorts of fancy ones. I’m sticking with my original guys, some of whom have names, and I’ll let the dilettantes spend big bucks and maybe in a couple of years, I’ll scoop some up from GoodWill shelves when the trendy folks spotlight something else. Those will probably have some scuff marks and maybe a missing arm or whatever; they will fit right in. It ain’t really class unless it’s got a nick or a chip or a dent from the fall from a mantle.
Finally, tugging with all my might, I got a 20-footlong tarp filled with leaves out to the driveway/curb. It did not contain the last leaf, nor even the 1,000th from last leaf, but after numerous efforts, I would say the yard is relatively raked. I honestly think one could count the number of leaves left; it might be a high number but it could be done.
I thought to myself: Now is the last time I will have to rake these leaves at 310 N. Riley? Is this the end of an era? I did not feel the least bit sentimental. 310 N. Riley vs. the Amazing AmeliaJake LeafRaker – I don’t think I won once, but I fought the good fight. At least I tell myself that.
I could post a picture of the tree that had golden leaves a couple of weeks ago, but the sticks it is now will be around for a long time. No hurry, and maybe I’ll actually post one of it coated in sparkling ice. Oh, joy.
I got to thinking about Christmas lights; I wasn’t going to put any out this year, but I think I will have one last stab at creating the effect of fireflies dancing in the air along the front of the house. You just have to pull down a branch on a bush, hook part of a string on it, let it whoosh back up, do it again and again and again . . . and come night, the randomness of the branches and the wind give it a magical appeal. And after seeing the Acrylic Pink Pig Ballerina, I think that would be a sedately dignified bit of festivity.
