Frango at Macy*s

I could say something about New Years and resolutions and new beginnings but honestly I can’t deal with new year stuff at solar new year… I always wait until lunar new year when I feel ready to deal with a fresh start.

So really – tonight doesn’t do a lot for me.  Besides, I’m tired and I want to go to bed.

So instead let’s discuss something fabulous I found out a couple of weeks ago… Macy*s carries Frango mints now.  How lovely is that?

I love Frango.  I started with the plain mints then the dark chocolate mints and now I’m rather addicted to the caramel chocolates.

YUM!

What wonderful news that is…  I’m so going to buy more and more of these lovely candies.

Focus on the positives in life!  How’s that for a new year’s comment?

Night!

I blame the animated movie genre

Dana and I went to the zoo and the aquarium today.  It was adventure on a grand scale involving 4 different MUNI lines and 4 BART trains.  I’m very tired now.

The single most impressive thing from the whole day is that animated moves have invaded out thought patterns when it comes to animals more than any amount of Animal Planet could ever over come.

Lemurs!  My favorite…  just think Madagascar.  Well it’s not MY first thought but that’s because I’m old and I remember the Lemur Island from the Sacramento Zoo of my youth.

Between The Lion King and Madagascar with a touch of Kung Fu Panda… most of the animals in the zoo were covered.

At least species recognition was good.  If not actual locations and behaviors.

But the bears we loved even more not because of the movies but because we are Bears ourselves… California Golden Bears of the UC Berkeley variety but we liked these Grizzly ladies a lot because they are just so FUZZY!!!

Oh and the snow leopard really did want to eat us for lunch.  The kids next to us confirmed it…

The tiger was more majestic and a lot less “I want to EAT YOU!!!”…  Don’t you think?

And on top of all the awesomeness?  There was an octopus statue in the lion fountain!!!

Going to the California Academy of Science and the Steinhart Aquarium was just a bonus.

I had a great day today… how was yours?

night

I can’t believe she did this to me

I love my stepmom and I know she loves me … so I’m confused about why she did this to me.

Why would she get me addicted to television again?

I don’t want to be addicted to television.  I don’t want to schedule my time around a network time slot.

Most of my life has been spent a slave to the television schedules.  But I kicked the habit.  I only watch TV shows once they are over and done with and the whole series is on DVD.  I have had my heart-broken by too many shows that I loved but never made it past their first season… too many shows that were canceled without an ending.

And I’m not so sure that the premature end to a show is worse than the shows that you love until they slowly dissolve under the pressure of too many seasons and not enough plot/character.

Here’s hoping I get over this before it all falls apart.

Jack Lord help me!

night

in which I fight my father’s espresso machine

I’m not entirely certain I won the battle although I did get a cup of coffee.

He left for work and abandoned me with the assumption that I could use his manual La Pavoni machine.

Yeah – not so much.

Like I said earlier – I got the americano in the end but not without fighting with sucker.  Wacky Italian primadonna.  Argh.

At first I was not sold on the idea of him getting a Keuring or Nespresso machine but after being left to my own devices I’m not as against it as I was.

Oh well – at least I go home tomorrow.  Back to my beloved Sugar – the Breville machine that never fights me… especially when she knows I need my caffeine.

Night from the hinterlands

Away from home…

I am at heart a home-body.   More than that I am a home-body from a family of home-bodies.

But I love my family.  I do.  I just wish I could teleport in for dinner and then go home.

Instead I drive in, spend a day or two, eat amazing meals, catch up with family… and sleep in a bed that isn’t mine… which is never really fun.  And then happily I head home to my beloved little warren of happiness and joy.

People ask why I don’t go home more often.  I think they think that by not visiting I am saying that I don’t love my family.  Which is absolutely not true.

I just want to sleep in my own bed.

Is that really so wrong?

Night… from farther away than usual.

My mother knits

So I already said that my mom knits.  A lot.  She’s really rather good.

I got a package for Christmas a few weeks ago.  She immediately started asking if I had opened my presents yet.

Ummm… no – I waited until Christmas like a good girl.  Want to see what I got?

She actually knit a fair isle bag and then felted it.  It’s amazing on its own and then you start to think about the individual stitches with the specific colors over and over again.  It’s more than slightly amazing if you ask me.

Crinkly yarn that was a tester for the sweater to come but it did quite work out.  Makes a rocking scarf and gotta love the grape Nehi color.

My new sweater.  This makes three made by Mom.  How cool is it… long sleeves because I pull them over my hands and a nice big cowl to pull down or up.  And the yarn is soft and fluffy!

But this… this is my FAVORITE of the lot.  It’s the same yarn as the sweater with a darker band at the very bottom.  It’s a big cowl that I pinned a bit tighter with my wooden shawl pin.  I must say I LOVE the comfort and warms of this little item.

I might begin to refer to it as my Theed.  Because it’s a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful thing that everyone, everyone, everyone needs.

But not at the cost of the forests… I’m pro Lorax… well not the movie but definitely the book and what it respresents.

Merry Christmas and goodnight.

a knitting library

Nick is moving… and as a part of the move he decided he wasn’t going to keep his knitting library anymore.  He wasn’t knitting like he used to since his photography has taken over most of his time.

But he didn’t want to give the books to just anyone.  He wanted to give them all to someone who would understand what he had collected.  He had put time into buying each book.  They deserved to not just be used but appreciated.

He was told that my mom is a serious knitter and he asked if I would like to take the books to her.

I didn’t know.  Mom knits, not me.  And she’s finicky about her books.  But when I looked at the books I recognized some of the authors names.  ((I do actually listen when my mom talks about knitting… it’s only polite since I want to keep getting knit presents.))

So I took the whole library home.  I called mom.  I read off the titles and authors and she went silent.

Apparently Nick is one hell of a collector and this is a rather impressive collection of knitting books.

Mom was rather thrilled to find out that I would be driving home soon because she wanted her books and they would be expensive to ship.

Thank you Nick for one heck of a Christmas present for my mom.  We are thrilled.

It does make me wonder what books Nick would pick out for the perfect cookbook library.

night

Ally’s new bag

I am rather shocked that I managed to finish the project I planned to complete today.

Usually I procrastinate a lot more than this.

See, Ally spends a lot of her time these days biking around the rainy city of Vancouver, BC, Canada.  And she wanted a bag that would deal with the biking and the rain.  But I don’t work in technical fabrics.  I’m just not set up for that.  But then during a sewing class I walked past a barrel of oil cloth and thought… well I can get close… more water resistant than anything else but still fun and one of a kind and original and all those things that Ally loves.

I even made her a detachable pouch for her cell phone since she needs to know where it is at all times… like the rest of us are okay with losing ours.

Now I just need to complete the Etsy transaction with her and ship it off to the location of her choice.

And tomorrow hopefully I will continue to be productive and I can start AND finish this project.

It has pockets!  I LOVE pockets!

night

Non-Shopper Remorse

In my more stupid moments of youth, I would buy things I didn’t really need or even desperately want from stores I window shopped in… almost like the price of admission or something equally as absurd.

I don’t do that anymore.  My fiscal well-being is way too important and also I have a healthy fear of hording these days.

But that doesn’t stop the niggling feeling of something close to shame when I window shop in a small, local business and don’t buy anything.

Today I was in a bookstore and realized I wanted to check the prices on She but couldn’t remember the author if I ever even knew the author.

I asked at the counter of this adorable little independent bookstore and was told the author was H. Rider Haggard.  I checked for a used copy that would be priced well above the price on the cover but still within range of my pocket-book… but no joy.  They had a new copy but it was trade sized paperback and much more expensive than I would have liked.

Oh well, live to shop another day.  But the woman behind the counter wanted to know why I wasn’t buying that copy.  It was the book I wanted.  I should buy it.

I explained that it was outside of today’s price range and she railed against Amazon and big businesses that can afford deep discounts that cut out the little merchants.  And I get that.  And I feel bad.  But not bad enough to buy the book.

Especially when I came home, logged onto the interwebs and found out that She is in the public domain and available in its entirety at Project Gutenberg.

I feel bad but what exactly am I supposed to do?

Oh well.

Night.

Glorious Ham!!!

Today I restocked the freezer with ham.

I like to go to Honey-Baked.

There’s a HoneyBaked shop on Piedmont and I am on their mailing list so I get all kinds of information about discounts.  And they are really pushing their wares this time of year.

I bought an eight pound ham… much bigger than what I normally buy but hey I wanted to make sure I had plenty of ham for those moments when I crave quiche, beans, soup, etc.

After sectioning the ham into good-sized portions, I vacuum seal them and throw them in the freezer.

I made yellow split peas with the leftover bone.

YUM!

I love ham.  Don’t you?

night