Promises, promises

I promised my mom that I wasn't going to get her anything for Christmas. Ooops. I am going shopping for her later today. Hahahahahahaha! Or should I have started that with Bwa? (To make it more maniacal?) Promise might be overstating it, though. We sort of commiserated over the fact that we didn't get anything for anyone this year. Oh well. She needs stuff under the tree.

Speaking of the tree, I brought it inside yesterday and decorated it last night. There will be tree pictures forth coming - I didn't take one of it decorated last night. My tripod is in the car still - my big tripod - which I picked up when I was last in Raleigh. I think it (the tree, not the tripod) needs watering already. I am afraid that it won't even last through Christmas. It is shedding already. Sigh.

No major picture posting yesterday - but I did get some other stuff done - primarily, I moved all of the boxes out of the living room into the dining room. One of my tactics for dealing with clutter, is to condense it - make it smaller and more compact  - so that a) it looks like there is less clutter, and b) it seems more manageable when it is all in one place - finite instead of overwhelming. We will see if it works. I also stealth sorted one of the boxes - yippee! Threw away probably a third of the box of paper. Every little bit helps, apparently. And I vacuumed! I know, right? :)

I also mailed two copies of Diary of a Plate Addict off - and one of Bar Dreams. Thank you Lesa and Marti! Two friends from Daily Challenge! So far, the people on Daily Challenge are being wonderfully supportive - four of them have bought copies! How awesome is that?! I am working on a blog post on the writing blog about the costliness of the books. Maybe it will be posted today - or tomorrow - we shall see - in any case - it is helping me to feel better about charging so much for them.

Mom's desire to be out and about continued yesterday - we went to the movies. She wouldn't pick, she doesn't like to pick, or decide generally. Except when she wants to. :) Anyway, I opted for The Muppets. I love Amy Adams - there wasn't enough of her in the movie - Jason Segel is ok - not my favorite - and I still enjoy the muppets (despite no Jim Henson or in this case, Frank Oz). Afterwards we dined on the haute cuisine of Wendy's - a place that mom mentions at least once every three days. Sigh.

Photos from December 20, 2011:

Before

After

Tree sans decorations...

The Muppets!

Accomplished

Got a good bit done yesterday. And something weird, and good, is happening. Mom is actually wanting to get out and do things?! How awesome is that? Yesterday she wanted to go to the Center for Concern to drop off three things. Not big things - didn't make a dent in what needs to be gotten rid of from the house, but the fact that she wanted to go out to do that was great! We accomplished that pretty quickly. On the way back to the house, she asked me what other errands I was planning. I told her again (sigh) that I was planning on doing laundry and getting a Christmas tree. She got all excited about the tree and wanted to do that - so we did. There was only one potted tree left, so we got that one. It is a nice little tree. Hopefully this one will fare better than last year's. This is how lame I am. I am going to put a reminder on my phone to water the tree...Some tree set-up will happen today - and some decoration tonight, most likely. She was not excited about the laundry and opted to be dropped at home while I did that by myself (yippee!). Speaking of initiating outings - mom wants to go to the movies today! I don't know what has come over her, but it is great!

So, we washed sheets yesterday. I love me some clean sheets! :) The laundromat was pretty empty which is fine by me - especially in my anti-social mood. It isn't really anti-social - it is just not really wanting to see anyone that I know. I don't mind meeting and harassing strangers.:) I also went to Wegman's and got some groceries. Including a holiday 12-pack from Saranac - some good sounding beers in there - and the ones I have tried so far have been tasty. I am saving the vanilla porter and the chococlate lager (never heard of a chocolate lager before) for later. And I got some salmon for mom for dinner.

Dinner turned out well - baked salmon with breadcrumbs and stuff on top - I whipped up a dill/sour cream sauce, steamed some beans, made a little rice - and later I made my first attempt at an apple crumble. Besides having waaaay too much caramel sauce on it, it was pretty good. Next time - one third or one quarter the amount of caramel.

Today - maybe a movie and dinner out - Friendly's or Ling Ling is my guess - and house neatening. I am moving the mess from the living room to the dining room. Yippee! I know the neatness won't last long, but all it needs to do is make it to the weekend - Christmas and all, apparently...

Photos from December 19, 2011:

Maybe the wind blew it over...

Mom heading in to - well, read the sign!

My huge purchase - two glasses with my initial! $.22! And Linda, a classmate of Karl's.

Our tree this year!

Yummy in all respects!

As I said, way too much caramel sauce!

Getting Older

I had thought of a great title and subject matter for a blog and poof - it is gone - out of my head. I ought to know better than to not write it down immediately when I think of it. Sigh, sigh, sigh. Oh well, c'est fromage.

Still feeling downright anti-social. Yippee! But I do need to get out and about today. Laundry to do, Christmas tree to buy, and groceries to shop for. I am wanting to make an apple crumble - got a lot of Ida red Apples sitting around that need to be eaten.

Got another month of photos done on Facebook yesterday! Hurrah! I plan to get another done today. That would be awesome. And mom and I had breakfast for dinner - I still haven't learned to get everything done at the same time. Oh well - the food still tasted good! Now I am trying to figure out the menu for the week. One of the great things about cooking for my mother is that she is appreciative of anything I feed her! I still smell like bacon from last night. Shower time! I figure once a month is probably a good thing whether I need it or not. Maybe that is why I am feeling anti-social...because I stink?

Being anti-social could also be affecting my blogging. I am just not feeling very interesting. Glarg.

Today's Daily Challenge was to watch a music video of a favorite song - I chose Scarlet Begonias from the Grateful Dead. Yay! Fun stuff and brought memories and tears. Not actual tears, just a bit of welling - from happiness and remembrance of things past. And I was struck by how awesome the technology is that allows us to do something like that. Speaking of which, I am not getting very far, very fast on my beer video blog. It will happen - just don't know when or how or what it will look like...

I really need to give up on the silly Gardens of Time thing. Just sayin'...

Photo from December 18, 2011:

I generally like my eggs over easy - mom likes hers over hard! This is twice baked potato, french toast, bacon and eggs.

I think I am up...

And not going back to sleep, so I might as well get today's post done. Soon, dear readers, you won't have this guy to kick around anymore. At least that is my thought. I am seriously leaning towards only writing sporadically. We shall see, of course. Truth be told, I am feeling anti-social and curmudgeonly. Not depressed, just not interested in much of anything or anyone. This is a phase and will pass. Truly.

I did accomplish what I wanted to yesterday. I finished the picture album for July. Today's goal - August! I also uploaded some pictures to the Diary of a Plate Addict Facebook page. Yippee for accomplishments. And that was about it. It was a cold day, here in Geneva, yesterday. And I woke up to snow! Eeeeek! I don't know how long it will last, but probably not till Christmas. The weather report says we are having four 40 degree days in a row starting Monday - so bye-bye snow. :(

Mom seems to be doing really well, once she gets up and gets out of bed. She is finally back to getting up for lunch and coming downstairs. And is actively taking part in its preparation. Go her! Besides that she is going through her mail and actually filling stuff out and such again. Yay!

We were supposed to go to the Colleges (HWS) holiday reception last night. Sadly, mom has a bit of a cold - I probably gave it to her - so she decided not to go. I was all set to go by myself, but at the last moment opted not to. I just didn't have a desire to go make small talk. I know, I ought to have gone, perhaps I would have met someone interesting. I just didn't feel like making the effort. Instead, I stayed home and made dinner - left over eggrolls and some sort of fried rice and vegetable glop. For tonight, I have two options - one - go shopping and get something - or two - make breakfast for dinner. I am leaning towards the latter...

I posted another entry in the writing blog. Starting to get those creative juices flowing - gosh it is an uphill battle...

Pictures from December 17, 2011:

First snow of the season! Not much, but I'll take it!

Dinner - the fried rice was a little under-fried. :(

Ding Dong, the...

Spanish Class is dead! Which old Spanish Class? The Wicked Spanish Class! Ding dong the wicked Spanish Class is dead!

Ok, so that doesn't scan so well, but you get the idea and the point.  Don't get me wrong - those of you who follow this blog and my life (and such) know that overall I enjoyed the class - I love to learn, I love to learn languages, I love meeting new people. All good things. I didn't enjoy getting up at an early hour 3 days a week. I didn't like the text book. And I didn't like having a commitment. Yup, I am a commitment-a-phobe. You read it here first. I took the exam yesterday - and I will be surprised if I got more than 20 points on it. Maybe 30. 10 points I just gave up on - apparently we were taught a new form during the week I was gone. Yippee! 10 free points for the rest of the class. Though how much they could have drilled it - anyway, moving on. I am happy that the exam is done! Woo hoo!! No more classes! Wheeeeee! Though I am thinking of taking a programming class if I can find one...

Other than that, not a lot went on yesterday. I got food for dinner and made steak, veggies, artichokes and twice baked potatoes - boy those turned out yummily! Watched an episode of Chuck - how have I missed so many of them? Well, I will just have to look on Hulu and see if they are there - I haven't been watching much television lately - either on the actual television or on the computer - I have been spending most of my entertainment hours with Skyrim. Yippee!

Now that the class is over, I can focus on the holidays a bit. And start to get caught up on some of the stuff I would like to get caught up on. Like putting pictures up on Facebook. And writing emails about the book. And figuring out Google Ad words. I am very excited!

Oh, my Spanish professor bought a copy of Diary of a Plate Addict. I mean, if he can, why can't my so called "friends" by copies? (For those of you who already own copies - I don't mean to belittle your thoughtfulness and support!)

Photos from December 16, 2011:

Mom's stuff plunked right down where I was studying - thanks mom! :)

Beautiful day for a Spanish Exam!

Dinner!

Finally Friday!

And I have just simply, plainly given up on getting a passing grade on the final exam for Spanish 102. Yesterday I took the practice test, the repaso, and I think I got a 20. That is out of 100. Sigh. I don't imagine doing much better today on the actual final. Not too upset by it, really. I like to excel. Really I do. And I think I have learned a lot. Enough in fact, that I can now make myself understood at a very basic level in Spanish - without too much guessing! Woo hoo! And that was one of the reasons that I took Spanish - so that I could finally have a grasp of fundamental grammar. Yippee! Not to stress over the grade I got in the course. I don't know how the grading works - what the weight of the quizes is (on which I did mostly poorly) or the other tests - one bad, the others ok - and the oral presentation - and then the final. I hope the final isn't like 50% of the grade. That would suck big time. Whatever. I will survive. And I still have many hours before it is finished. Sigh. I might do a little more studying for the thing. We shall see. The long and the short of it is, though, that I just don't want to study anymore...

What else did I do yesterday? Right. Nothing. At all. Well, played a bit. And made a couple of meals - lunch I whipped up a little chicken salad sandwich for mom - a bowl of chicken noodle soup for me - and then dinner was one of my comfort food meals - hot dogs and baked beans. Yum! Added a little left over broccoli and a little home made coleslaw. Yay!

Oh, and felt sorry for myself - only for a minute or two - but still, it was there - for feeling a bit under the weather. This too shall pass!

Ok, short post because, well, nothing really to write about today. Nothing pithy is passing through my pate...

Pictures from December 15, 2011:

Later, mom deposited a pile of her papers smack dab in the middle of where I was doing my studying - I took that as a sign to stop studying for good! :)

Mmm, hot dogs and baked beans - and sides!

Still ill

After all these years...no, wait, that is something else. Anyway, I am. Still ill, that is. Not horribly, not horrendously - just enough to be slightly annoying. I am using the illness to find my inner peace with not being perfect. Or finding perfection in being imperfect. Or...

Yesterday was beer day! Yippee! I also mailed Cate 14 copies of Diary of a Plate Addict. I wonder if she will actually be able to sell any. I am not holding my breath. They are signed, which is something. My good friend, Jeff, wrote a review of DPA and posted it on Amazon. How cool is that? I am going to steal it and put it on a couple of pages - the DPA Facebook page and on one of the Renottopress pages! If anyone else wants to write a review, that would be awesome!

I still have lots of things I ought to be doing that I am just not. I realized the other day, that I was behind in posting my monthly "One picture a day" on Facebook. I would like to get that done at some point. I also want to put pictures from the first sales trip to Raleigh on the DPA page. Those are the two biggies at this point. Oh, and studying for Spanish. I didn't really do much yesterday. And the exam is tomorrow. Eeeek.

I would rather not go outside today - but I want to get a Christmas tree. I am thinking I will just wait until Friday after the exam to get one. Maybe it will cheer me up after failing the final. Ok, I probably won't fail it, but I sure won't ace it. I have forgotten so much that we "learned" this semester. Sigh. It is early yet - though I could do with a nap...

Oh, back to beer day. I went to Beef and Brew and they hadn't changed the beers. But they did institute a new Augustus policy - that any beer I wanted would be discounted! Wow, I feel special! I don't know how well the place is doing. I hope they last long enough for me to get through all of their beers. Is that a selfish thought? Probably. I had fun there, as usual, despite being a smidge under the weather. Lorraine and Tiffany didn't have anything new and exciting going on in their lives. I met Evan, a server there - who also works at Eddie Bauer out at the outlet mall. If I weren't feeling sick, I would go out there and buy a piar of pants or a shirt or something. I could use either one of those. Not a huge priority...Oh, I also ordered the peking duck from Wing Tai for Christmas Eve! Yippee! The woman was surprised when I spoke Mandarin with her. Sadly, my vocab is so rusty, that I didn't recognize the word for doctor when she said it. Glarg. So, the beers I had were good ones! The first - Naked Dove's Naught and Nice Christmas Ale tasted sort of like a gingerbread man. Very easy to drink. Next was Wild Blue - which is made here in NY. I didn't realize that. Pretty good too, for a blueberry beer. And lastly, Oskar Blue's Old Chub - Scottish Ale. Yum!

For dinner, we had Mexican style food - I made chicken quesadillas, refried beans and rice. Yum city! Are you all envious of my cooking skills yet? :)

Photos from December 14, 2011:

A decoration at the lovely Beef and Brew!

Yay Mexican dinner!