PAPRIKA AND SPICE AND EVERYTHING NICE

A Tale of Two Weeks

OR 

How Smoked Paprika, Onion and Garlic Powders Save the World:

Scene 1: A recovering GingerMan wanted something approximating real food, so I hopped to the store after work and picked up chicken, as requested.  Into a pan, salt and pepper only, brown rice on the side.  Yay.  A few days later, he’s moved on, and there’s still plain chicken in the fridge.  A million things to do, and not much effort to expend, as I have no energy at the moment.

Scene 2: A family Holiday Breakfast, what can I do in batches large enough to feed the Pacific Fleet, full of complex flavor which such endeavors sometimes lack, especially when dietary needs must be met?

My Go-To Team: Smoked Paprika, Toasted Onion Powder and Garlic Powder.  They’re like having Cinnamon, Ginger and Nutmeg for baking.  A few things which play well alone, together, then team with others to save your bacon.  And eggs.  And stir-fry, risotto, meatloaf or squash soup.

Reasons to go with Smoked and Toasted: Developed flavors.  The work is done for you, naturally.  The peppers and onions are dried and smoked/ toasted, then ground so they are deep and easy to incorporate into anything.  BONUS POINTS: Ground Chipotle Pepper.  Adds a small to moderate amount of heat depending on the amount used with a huge amount of naturally smokey pepper flavor added to your dish.

The following are two new spins:

SOLUTION ONE: CHICKEN SALAD!

2-Large Broiled chicken breasts, cubed

1/4 mayonaise

1/4 greek yogurt

3 Large radishes, diced

3 TB Red Onion, finely diced

2 TB Toasted Sunflower Seeds

2 TB Roasted Peanuts, chopped

1/4 tsp Smoked Paprika

1/4 tsp Toasted Onion Powder

1/8 tsp Garlic Powder

1/4 tsp Penzeys Bavarian Seasoning (Crushed Brown Mustard Seed, Rosemary, etc.)

Kosher Salt and Pepper to Taste--The Chicken was already seasoned, and the Seeds, Peanuts, and Paprika all add savoriness so I didn’t add any extra.

1) Cube or Shred the Chicken, your preference, place in medium bowl.  Dice radishes, onion and add to bowl.  

2) In a separate bowl, mix mayo and yogurt.  This is my favored mix, both for this and tuna, BUT you must feel free to fiddle with the mayo/yogurt ratio to achieve your own private Nirvana.  

3) NOW, add the really good stuff--Smoked Paprika, Toasted Onion Powder (yes, from Penzeys, regular White Onion Powder is great too,) and the Bavarian Seasoning.  In lieu of Bavarian, I should think some Poultry Seasoning, a little extra crushed Rosemary (ooo-yum if fresh!), and maybe some dried or prepared mustard should do the trick, but I do love me some Bavarian blend, Bubb.  

4) Add half the dressing and mix lightly, then add half the remaining and the seeds and nuts, mixing lightly again.  

5) Stand back, admiring your creation.  Taste it.  Is it fresh and savory? Can you taste the chicken, but also the fresh crispness of the radish and the toastiness of the spices and peanuts?  Add the rest of the dressing to desired level of creaminess, plate, grab some crackers and try to control yourself.  

6) It is wonderful on it’s own.  It is fabulous on: Wheat bread or Toasted Sourdough, as a sandwich; on toasted rye or pumpernickel points, or a good, crispy cracker such as Triscuits.

SOLUTION 2: BISCUITS AND GRAVY!

So by adding The Three to the Bavarian we come to a piquant, herby flair.  But sometimes you want rich.  Down-home.  Family food. Say, Biscuits and Gravy? The regular recipe is traditionally....light on seasoning, so to achieve ultimate savoriness, I take the Spice Road:

I start, (as we did in Sept 2011 “Good Gavy! And Biscuits!”), with the traditional Sausage Gravy for Biscuits from the Joy of Cooking, pg. 547, calling for 8oz sausage then the standard 2-2-2 Fat-Flour-Dairy ratio to build a classic White Sauce.  

EXTRA RESTYLING:

A) This was for Easter Brunch, where a few people couldn’t/ shouldn’t eat pork, so I now regularly sub Turkey Italian Sausage, with Fennel.  

HMMM...ENOUGH SAUSAGE?

B) You will need the full amount of the fat as Butter, as there will be effectively no fat from the sausage. 

C) You will want to split the types of dairy 80%/20% to achieve creaminess and viscosity.  I’m OCD, your mileage my vary. Other effective Combinations include Half&1/2 + Whole Milk or Whole Milk + 2%, but I really wouldn't reduce fat content below that if your aim is the time-honored super-creamy, thick sauce.  (Weight Watchers, bless their healthy hearts, claim you can make sauce with just flour and skim milk, and as a physics experiment this is true.  The result cannot be described in words.)

Also note, this is triple the published recipe, for family servings:
  

24oz Turkey Italian Sausage, browned and crumbled

6 TB Butter

6 TB Wondra Superfine Flour

32oz (1qt / 4 cups) Heavy Cream

16oz (1 pint / 2 cups) Whole Milk

2 TB Smoked Paprika (Regular Sweet will, technically, work, but will NOT render the delicious, unctuous smokey flavor)

2 TB Toasted Onion Powder

1-2 TB (3-6 tsp) Garlic Powder--Your preference.  I live 30 miles away from the Garlic Capital of the World, so you can imagine how I roll.

1.5 tsp Kosher Salt-- To start.  I add more at the finish to taste

Follow all directions to construct Sauce, then,

YES, I RAN TWO SIX-CUP PANS AT A TIME, YO.

TO FINISH:

-Salt to taste

-1.5 tsp Ground Black Pepper, see Salt

-Dashes of Hot Pepper Sauce--I say Crystal Hot Sauce, possibly Tabasco Chipotle; and the stated 2 Dashes per 2 cups gravy are, to me, laughably uninspiring.  The Sauce is to add flavor more than heat, but until you're an experienced splasher, dash with wisdom and constraint to be sure Hotness has not overcome the desired Flavor. 

Add Sausage back in, ladle over Biscuits et VOIL`A!  

So put a little Spice in your Nice (enough), or, if you are Jedi Jasmin, Super Jenius, (courtesy of http://melomeals.blogspot.com/2011/09/how-to-build-raw-kale-salad.html) you can add a little Hale 'n' Hearty to your Kale Salad--Have a Party!  

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BARRED

“...So I am improving...and now GingerMan is turning his attention to his annual Spring Migration to Ireland...”

OR not.  Bags were about to be packed, Days out from Departure numbered T-3 and counting.

It seems no matter what I did to scrub my hands raw or disinfect switches and faucets as I went, GingerMan caught the plague.  The Sunday before his trip.  It started in the morning, so I bundled him into the guest room, donned apron and gloves and scrubbed the house top to bottom with bleach.  Called the doctor, told them what the ER Angels had given me, they called in a scrip Monday morning and he was well on his way that evening.  Pissed off, but way better off than I had been.  My hands, on the other--um, hand--- were puffy, red, raw, scratched and stinging.

Enter Lavishea Lotion Bars.  In the interests of Equality, I will also mention the gorgeous Bar Maids Lo-Lo Bars.  What the Whaaa? You ask?

A lotion bar.  Comes in a little round tin, made of various oils, waxes, natural stuff and it was not until this utter catastrophe struck and my Yarn Posse texted en masses that I realized I had run out of these about a year ago and never stocked up again. They are ingredients formed into a small cake, which you pop out of the tin, rub on the affected area and pop back in the tin.  No Muss, No Fuss.

 I am a dedicated follower of Bar Maids lip balms, they are now the only ones allowed in the house.  When GM and I first met, he had, possibly, the Worst Lips in the World.  The US, even in the humid regions, is a drastically dryer place than Ireland.  By a LOT.  In the Old Country, you leave bread out, here, that's Death.  When we go home for holidays, we never use lotion and my hands look 10 years younger, here my skin falls off if I don’t moisturize every 6 hours religiously and after every hand washing.  

So we are on a strict balm regimen, with happy smoochers to show for it. Lately, I have had specific skin allergies which have reduced me to one specific type of body lotion recommended by my doctor, but before that, I knocked my bad self out with the panoply of scented wonders from these companies, even when I couldn’t use any other scented products on the market.

Their ingredients are pure, and great for all skin types.  Lavishea bars are a little dryer than the Bar Maids to the touch.  Bar Maids has an entire line of cool stuff including several facial products, a natural baby line (tested by my niece, the Intrepid Danger Mouse), and the O For Feet’s Sake bar.  I am a makeup and body-care ‘Ho, and love them all, so I can’t honestly give you a preference for one over the other.  

DID I MENTION-LO-LO Has Luscious Flavors???? OOOO YUMMO!

OH!! And this is the NUGGET OF KNOWLEDGE, hidden like those stupid morals tacked on to the end of a He-Man- Masters of the Universe episode: 

FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY IN THE UNIVERSE, WASH YOUR HANDS.  DOCTOR STYLE.  PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR FINGER TIPS AND WASH ALL THE WAY UP THE WRISTS.  

IF SOMEONE CLOSE TO YOU HAS NORO OR A RELATED VIRUS, USE A BLEACH CLEANER TO CLEAN YOUR KITCHEN, THE BATHROOMS AND ALL LIGHT SWITCHES, REMOTE CONTROLS AND FAUCETS.

ESTABLISH, IF POSSIBLE, A “CLEAN” BATHROOM AND A “SICK” BATHROOM AND KEEP THEM SACRED AND SEPARATE.

IF YOU HAVE A REFRIGERATOR WATER/ICE SPIGOT, BE SURE YOU ARE CLEANING THAT WITH BLEACH BETWEEN EACH USE.  ALL PARTS OF IT.

IF POSSIBLE, DO NOT ALLOW THE SICK PERSON TO USE THE KITCHEN!!!!

So, otherwise, yes, this is nothing but a shill, but only because it’s been a grossbuckets two weeks round here, and these literally saved the skin on my hands and made me a bit happier. They are available at many local yarn shops and online at http://www.lavishea.com/ and https://bar-maids.com/.  Also, if you are attending any local fiber festivals, knitting conventions and whatnots, check to see if the Bar Maids are in attendance--you’ll hear the whooping and laughter a mile away!  They are more fun than a barrel of monkeys and you will love supporting a great company by treating yourself.

Herein ends the sermon, I am knackered.  I’m even skipping knitting today.  I’ve cleaned and tidied and worked all week and I am just gonna droooool today.  Except I keep coming up with things to do.  So Still Not Bored.  Then there’s Treadmill Time.  OH!  Okay, next time I’ll tell you about all the movies I’ve watched in the last week and a half!  

As Calvin said to Hobbes, the days are just packed!  

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"WOULD YOU LIKE A LITTLE ICE CREAM?"

So I’m going to tell you my little story, and give you a link to one of my favorite stories.  I want to you watch it, with lots of tissues.  Don’t be afraid.  Just do it.  You know, cuz your allergies might act up--happens to GingerMan, like when we watch ST II Wrath of Khan.

THIS week, I got Noro virus. Tuesday, Hoooorah.  Which officially makes GingerMan the best partner ever, as Wednesday night was spent in the ER, after which I was deposited at home, still nauseous and disgusting and by then wanting to cry, at midnight.  Midnight.  At which time GingerMan goes right back out to the 24-hour Understaffed, Overworked, Manned by Angels Walgreens Pharmacy.  Mid. Night.  Goeth the man who still has not eaten, after a full day at work, after working from home the day before to make sure I didn’t die falling over or something.  (BTW-While we were gone, MaryKay Carol dropped off Clorox Cleaner with Bleach-proven to kill the virus, and Jedi Jasmin made Chicken Ginger Broth, proven to kill everything evil and fill your world with rainbows.)

He turns in the prescription for what the ER nurse described as the anti-nausea “Miracle Drug.”  He waits, with a bag of Doritos and some trail mix in the car for another hour or so.  Then he comes home, pills me, eats and then asks if I’m good so he can go to bed.

I was lying at the precise angle that prevented me from yakking, and garnering all my reserves to not cry and said yes go to bed.  The meds took hold in the night and I actually slept for 4 hours. Still on the sofa, but with my shirt on.  Oh, patented system--and you don’t want the explanation.  But still...

So I am improving.  By Thursday night I ate some yogurt and GM could turn the TV on without turning me green.  Friday, Day 4, was TOAST DAY!  One whole plain piece!  Life is improving from there, and now GingerMan is turning his attention to his annual Spring Migration to Ireland.

I like me some time alone. I watch movies and cook Dinner for One with impunity.  I knit, I read, I go out with friends, and I can say what is usually applicable to my life--I am never really bored. I do it well. Better than he does, but I’m not bragging, because honestly--very, very honestly, I have a paranoid inner anxiety that maybe it means he loves me more and I can just get right along.

Except for my even deeper inner anxiety that he will die on a trip.  It grinds into me, burrows further down the farther in advance he plans.  Something will happen and the very one person in the world I have loved more than things, more than places, more than any other person, more than breathing, will be gone.  In 2002, when we were going to try on my wedding gown, my mom asked if I had been in love with my first (insert any ol’ words you like here) spouse and I said no, without having to consider.  Because I didn’t have a clue what the concept even was.  After GingerMan and I met, I forgot what life had been before, at Warp Factor 9.  Twelve years later it is possible to remember times and events, but no sense of living without him.  I have an ice-cold fear in my heart and soul that I could never get along without him.

I’d stick it somehow.  It occurred to me recently that I have finally accrued a bit of mileage, a bit of experience and some small portion of confidence.  I’ll fall right the fuck apart, but, well, what the hell do you want?

I’ve watched this particular short film many times.  It was featured on PBS as part of a nationwide story-telling project, shown at the end of features, and Danny and Annie remind me of us (link here JIK:  http://youtu.be/WNfvuJr9164). A schlub (me) and a catch (GM), and how a rag-tag duo found happiness until the end.  And then dealt with the end.  I know all of this sounds maudlin and macabre, but I’m an atheist and a realist and like to just deal with the scary shit.  I have lifelong severe anxiety about loss and loneliness and this film has really served as a training video, of sorts.  Whenever GM heads for the airport, the cold, black fear grips me, and then I think of Danny and Annie.  

Our affairs are in order.  We say “I Love You” so many times in one day you’d think we wouldn’t hear it but we do.  One night I wrote “I Love You” on little sticky-notes and stuck them in a heart shape on the counter around his morning cereal bowl and juice glass.  I was sick on Valentine's Day so he drove 40 miles round trip to get the flowers he’d sent to my job, even though I’d get them the next day.  Sometimes he picks up some Pretzel M&M’s (TM) at the grocery store just to see me giggle. 

“...She lights up my life when she says at night would you like a little ice cream...”

We each think JEEEEZUZ I was never good enough to catch you!  But that can only possibly be true one way and we’re each sure it’s the other way so we’ve reached détente and just swap pandas and “discuss” what to watch on TV during dinner.

Well, come to think of it, you don’t really have to watch it, but please do anyway, Danny and Annie are lovely people, with a lot to say about love and living.  Doesn’t apply solely to partners, there’s a lot of us in Friend Webs out here, and you know we’d be there with you in the ER at midnight when you need us, and definitely, definitely tell you to eat more ice cream--

--it’s medicine.  And Love.

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OF BUST DARTS AND BOOBAGE

Diddly dum, it's January, diddly doot, Here's February! Oh dear, I've caught The Flu. No, not THAT flu, the one I was vaccinated for, the OTHER one, as I presented myself to the doctor, stuffy, snurffly, completely exhausted.  "Weeeeellll-- itmayhavestartedasviralbut it'sdefinitelybacterialnow.  Here's your antibiotic."  Which worked very nicely, but for being so knackered I learned the intricate weave pattern of our high-thread-count sheets over the next two and a half weeks. That's most of February done by the time I crawl back to work, but then ZOMG,  it's 

STITCHES WEST 2013!!!!

A total yarn-gasm, five days of fiber-y awesome. This was my fifth Stitches since I started knitting in 2009, and it was a blow-out-- Helen Devine came from Pittsburg, Knit Cafe Abby camped out with me, CogKnitive Podcast's Dr. Gemma bunked with the Knitmores and Bèbè Knitmore made several extremely cheerful and well-behaved public appearences, with her handler the Most Excellent Daddy, Andrew.              

A whole mad bunch of us filled out Lily Chin's Bust Darts class thursday, then Mary Kay Carol and I carried on to Marly Bird's fantastic Curvy Knits class friday. Both of which collectively count as The Best Class I've Ever Taken.  We explored the nature of being fuller-figured.  Busty.  Plump.  Of following patterns faithfully, having taken the requisite few standard measurements, namely bust and maybe waist and upper arm or shoulders, but not often, then just zooming along.  Then ending up with: A jumper which is puzzlingly shorter in front after absailing sometimes prodigious boobage. One which fits like a sack due to poor shaping when the designer can't be bothered; or has a neckline ample enough for a two-headed baby calf because the pattern writer took their lovely size-6 pattern, plugged it into a computer program which extrapolated from bust measurements and made no appropriate decreases over the shoulders to the neck as per standard human anatomy.

We graphed.  We did Geometry.  We did Maths.  Just before the break in Lily's class I nearly had a nervous breakdown, but Carol talked me off the ledge.  A 'Dart', if you will examine, perhaps, your favorite fitted dress or skirt, properly distributes fabric around curvy areas of your anatomy.  It seems easy with sewing--pinch the extra material from the inside, secure and sew. The trick with knitting is, you're working with negative space.  You literally chart out a triangle of negative space, stitches you will never knit, then knit a Curve in the Fabric of Space and Time. Stephen Hawking's got nuthin' on me now.

Next day in Marly's class we were given a magnificent packet full of segments containing a woman's form, diagrams of a specific area of measurements and the maths for that area. As with Lily's class, we learned that measurements are everywhere--lengths of everything, distances between, well, ya know...everything. Shoulder to shoulder, Shoulder to hip, nip to...yup, everything.  Unless you want 1963's On-Trend Bullet Boobs, you better measure those "Bust Points".  Meaning that I now hold the Keys to the Jumper Designing Universe.  I can take Lily's Short Row Bust Darts, insert them into Marly's Chart 5, Do a Little Dance, Eat a Little Pie, et VOILÀ! Have a sweater design, including properly designed set-in arms, which will fit who I really am.

So who am I?  I'm the girl who was insecure and pointless four years ago, and laid off from a law firm, so I walked into a yarn shop and said Howdy.  I'm the girl who is weird and wonderful and crazy-ass and colorful and strange, but never knows who she is from the inside.  A dreamer, yes, but tidy and practical and reassuring.  I am a Virgo and an Earth Ox.  I love to cook and party and knit and party and hang out and party because four years ago I entered a weird and wonderful and crazy-ass family of colorful and strange people, and Stitches is our Woodstock.  I'm the girl who yells out in Lily Chin's Short Row Bust Darts class:  "SO--BUST DARTS ARE HEEL FLAPS FOR TITS!!!!!" 

 Eureka.

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JINGLE JANGLE JINGLE

NOTE: This is a a combination of two posts I thought uploaded and did not, but due to Costco-Instituional-Size Madhouse craziness in December I did not realize.  So here goes--Pics of my psycho-crazy awesome tree and other Acts of Home Decorating, as well as some cool Christmas swag!

So I luuuurrrrv me some Christmas.

Hahaha I know, I just about threw up telling you all about that in the last few weeks.  But my tree--ohhh, my tree.  I've been refining my tree for years.  Every Autumn, I am that Crazy Lady Who's First In Line When The Trees Go Up at Macys in August.  Yup, that's me.  I luuuuuuurv me some ornaments.  Cool ones, funny ones, beautiful ones.  Ornaments that remind us of the UK and family we miss and places we've been.  

My tree, when being dressed, has sections:   Classic White and Blue, 30’s-50’s Style, Toys, Disney, Travel, Fancy, Inherited.  I have bead chains in classic red, ice blue, silver and light green; and two toppers, one a large Tinker Bell whose wings are edged in fine LEDs which change colors,  and a large gold star, both wired into the top as a designer taught me to do for better stability and show.

Being our third Christmas in this house, I finally bought lighted garland for my Pottery Barn Staircase (the official name for this feature in my house--I always wanted the Pottery Barn Staircase):

For many years I had a red metallic tinsel tree that was finally just too cheesy so I brought in from the garage a lovely small tree that had been my grandmothers.  I fooled around a bit with ornaments as scaling is difficult, but came up with some needlepoint stocking ornaments she had made when I was small and then made some paper snowflakes out of scrapbook paper:

I also had some red berries and candles stripped from an “Early Crafty Period” centerpiece once I, erm, matured, creatively,  and have toted these silly bits around three or four house moves.  But I just opened the bag and went “hmmmmm”.  Yup, genius at work over here... It ain’t over till the easily over-excited hoarder says “Hmmmm”.  

So the house is Golden-Lit and Cozy, and I am immeasurably Happy. Still plowing through work, and seeing a few shows up in the city, the season is buzzing along, and I am Happy.  Here's Happy to you, too.

>>>BOXING DAY POST: Note, this should have gone out on 26 December 2012.  I was not on the ball, checking- Blogger's-new-insta-links-to-FaceBook-posting-wise.  Olè!!


"...And the Stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there..."

So I worked Christmas Eve, drove like a demon to J's house for the family crab dinner (stop here to be jealous), drove home and wrapped presents till 1am.  At which point GingerMan says "you don't have to do all this." Meaning at some point I should have realised how many freakin' Xmas gift bags I have upstairs and should have retreated to bed two hours earlier.  

So I was mature and well-reasoned about the situation.  I had two more full days ahead and thought I'd take Mr. Helpful's advice.  I stomped upstairs, grabbed the biggest gift bag I had, grabbed his large box of a gift (the Dyson Hot+Cool Fan Heater) and thumped back downstairs.  I plonked the box on the kitchen table, threw the up-ended bag, a cheerful blue background with repeated scenes of ice-skating Santas, over the top, and it being several inches short, created a picture of not so much an act of festive generosity as a high-end hostage-taking.

Up early Christmas morning, baked the bacon for an army, gathered the pressies and packed us in the Prius for the journey to Jasmin Land.  Caramel Brioche French Toast, OJ, Bacon, Whipped Cream.  Pressies.  A 1-year-old on her First Christmas, for whom wrapping paper and ribbon are a Gift From the Universe.  Gifts, on the other hand, well, get in the way.... I got  a Tardis iPhone case and a hand-sewn Van Gogh Tardis Print (in the Top 5 Episodes EVAR--go download it) knitting project bag, created by Gigi and some KICKASS GNOME STITCH MARKERS (Courtesy of Jedi Jasmin):

All in all, lovely and relaxing.  OH, dinner with my parents in two hours.  Rush and rush, up the freeway with the rest of the goods and a lot more dessert.  

A lovely evening, which also netted a BlueRay of Brave, the AWESOME Chiaogoo Interchangeable Needle Set:

And, miraculously, a Bluster Bay swift.  Yah, you read it here.  GingerMan got me the sweetest swift in the wild, wild west, chickens.  It's still packed in bubble wrap, I'll show it off later.  

Now I've shown off my newest worldly possessions like a greedy 5-year-old, I should expound the virtues and meanings of this season, etc. etc., but really that's what I'm saying.  People I would actually love anyway, people I cook for willingly and sometimes just out of the blue, people I would share cake with, gave me cool stuff.  Kinda nice, I think.... 

Oh hang about, they did get the cake first...Hey! Where did the cake go!!!! Oh bother.  Well, there is New Year's...and until then, ...Happy Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!

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LIGHTBOX, BABY

Lightbox

smoooOOOoooosh

Ooooh the beauty, grandeur and joy of the holidays. 

How I did revel in the fairy lights and my beautiful tree and the Crazy Christmas Barf Yards throughout the lower Bay Area.  Some real treats, I gotta tell ya--

Tiny townhouse front patches filled to the last square centimetre with huge blow-ups all jostling for wiggle room. Epilepsy-inducing light displays of such discordance as to warrant an FAA investigation into air traffic interference for sure, cresting rooftops then cascading down gutters and walls to the ground below to create miasmic displays of weird character tableaux and Santa landing strips.  Cuz he sure as hell ain’t gonna make it down within twenty feet in any dimension of that chimney. It’s a major cause of traffic in neighborhoods and an absolute delight, among many others.

smOOOoooooooossssshh

OOoooooh Christmas music, especially at work.  I would have cheerfully played the christmas mp3 chip another two months than replace it with the regular chip again--6 versions of Let’s Go Fly a Kite and four versions of the Immigration Song and five versions of Rainbow Connection?  Mele Kalikimaka!  All I Want For Christmas Is You!

Not to mention the eight versions of God Only Knows What I’d Do Without You (most of them by completely inappropriate children’s choirs) and the 4 versions of Desperado (same).  Then there’s the heavy concentration of Carpenter’s lovin’, Jeebuz-lovin’, America-lovin’ and John Denver lovin’.  Oh, and some truly terrible renditions of just about everything including Road to Nowhere by some unattributed men’s choir who couldn’t carry these poor tunes in a coffin as a team of pall bearers.

smmm00oooooshhhhh......

So everything was going so beautifully.  And January was not looking so crowded and stressful as last year. Then...

Smoosh.

I woke up one day a couple of weeks ago and could not get out of bed.  I tried a little kindness.  I’ve been working hard, it’s been a long retail season, I can loaf in bed, it’s only...

11AM.

I went to bed at 10.30 the night before, ostensibly because I was just soooo tired, but really because I could not think of any reason to stay awake.  I had slept for twelve hours. The weight of Things to Be Done, yes, right there.  Glum Post-Holiday Gloomies, yup, present and accounted. Logical.  But not The Reason.  As the days went on, my brain shut down and my soul turned black.  Seeing people was painful, noise was painful, being touched was painful.  F*&king SAD. Sad, stupid, retarded, asinine brain lapse. So tired. 

In response, I am angry and resentful.  It’s not like losing a few days here and there to a cold or the flu.  It’s like having the entire meaning of my life surgically drained with a large-bore syringe jammed straight into my cerebral cortex.

So I have gone to doctors and friends and talked about it. How brilliant are friends???? I have purposefully socialised.  I have read new books and gone to movies.  The light box is out and shining as we speak.  GingerMan has ordered his new car which he has dreamed of and saved his pennies for ages to commute ecologically but for size means my car will now be parked in the driveway.  Which will open an area less-than-car-but-just-more-than-treadmill-size in the garage.  The car won’t arrive for a while, but I want to acquire the machine soon, just to get moving.  I have never found the Exercise Endorphin Promised Land of which others speak, but walking all over Edinburgh and London for a month last summer left me feeling really really good about myself, stronger and streamlined, so I just want to get on it.

I’ll try to get back to the fun New Year Fairy 2013 Looking Forward blog next week.  I have the last of the 2012 photos of good times, and a heartwarming story about a chocolate cake that learned to hate me, but tasted brilliant anyway, leading to the Fairy 2013 Slogan.  So hang tight, friends, see you on the light side.

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BARENAKED XMAS ROCKIN'

Barenaked ROCKIN’

To begin, I’m layin’ down my favorite holiday tracks for this year.  As with last time, however, I have a soundtrack for today’s blog:  Chris Isaak’s Christmas on TV.  It’s just a cool, twangy christmas honky-tonk tune. Toodle-yoo-off you go!

Well Howdy-Ho!  Nice to have you back!  So I just had to refresh my long-playing Xmas playlist, populated with the hits of my childhood-- Andy Williams, Peggy Lee, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, on and on and ohhh I do love them and always will, but this is a lovely, zippy holiday season and I need some sparkle!  This year has been notable in that I’ve actually bought whole albums, both as they were priced reasonably compared to several singles, and because there were really rich offerings.

While I did have a few Michael Bublè added a couple of years ago from the Let It Snow EP, this year I added his Christmas album (2011), featuring standards and a couple cool originals.

I will shoehorn in a perennial favorite just while it’s playing here-- A SouthPark Christmas.  It’s vile, rude, original and completely awesome.

Barenaked For the Holidays (2004) is possibly one of the best christmas albums of the modern age.  The Barenaked Ladies turn out lots of originals, three Hanukkah songs that are  well done (face it, some of the stuff you hear on the radio sounds like someone said “well, we have to have something.”), crowned by the absolutely killer I Saw Three Ships and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.  Oh! and Elf’s Lament, with Michael Bublè!

Now to Josh Groban, I lovelovelovelove him.  His music, like James Blunt’s isn’t always on my top 10, but his work is beautiful and soulful and rich and this is a crowning glory.  Also like James Blunt, he is a total cutie, completely charming and lovely and referring to the above single, his original work is heartbreaking genius.   Buy the whole album.

I have loved Rod Stewart since I was a kid, and we recently saw him on Graham Norton while eating Saturday Breakfast (Saturday is Graham; Sunday, Modern Family) and I dug into iTunes to see if he had a single or two.  Try a whole kickin’ album-- Merry Christmas, Baby.  More great standards, some neato duets and fun originals.  

Now for some favorite singles, my Top 13:

1) Mele Kalikimaka- Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters

2) Merry Xmas Everyone-Slade

3) The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee

4) Fairytale of New York- Pogues and 

5) Santa Baby- Kylie Minogue
6) All I Want for Christmas is You- Mariah Carey
7) Christmas Blues- Dean Martin
8) Christmas Night in Harlem- Louis Armstrong
9) Christmas Wrapping- Waitresses
10) Baby It’s Cold Outside- Tom Jones and Cerys
11) Swiss Colony Beef Log- A South Park Christmas
12) Christmas Time in Hell- A South Park Christmas
13) The Christmas Song- Mel Tormè

Back to hoppin’ round the house like a snowbunny on crack!  Back with more in a couple days!

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