Dorie’s Different Reality

Well, a BIG snow anyhow. So far, the heat and the lights are staying on, so it’s a day of enforced rest except for first responders, medical people and grocery store clerks!

Got some action shots!

This is the front end of Pyrate’s truck….the lump next to it is my little car- buried!

This is the front yard. Mail delivery was suspended, so I don’t have to wade out there!

And this is the official “snow gauge” picture. That’s the picnic table on the deck, demonstrating how many inches of snow we’ve had in the last 18 or so hours!

So if you’re in the neighborhood, drop by for tea. I’m sure not going out today!

I’m depressed about my shoe size. 10 D
I used to be an 8 1/2 B, but feet grow to accommodate weight- big bummer. Online shopping really helps because I can’t just walk into a shoe store and find my size. 10’s are hard to find in general. My theory is the young people (in their 20s) started life as big healthy babies - 8 and 9 pounders, and now as adults are taller with longer feet as well.  Anyhow, all this competition for the size 10s isn’t making the hunt for my fantasy shoes any easier. I’d like to find a nice clog or Mary Jane casual shoe, but I want it in dark green. Doesn’t that sound pretty? Just a bit of color.  I feel like Opus the Penguin wishing for wings that work.

Imbolc or Candlemas today. Choose your tradition. I lit one candle this morning. I worry a lot and to me a flame represents Hope, or Remembrance. I was in that sort of mood.  I look things up, like the Day in History for this blog, and that’s how I found out today is a special day.
“Down with the rosemary, and so
Down with the bays and mistletoe;
Down with the holly, ivy, all,
Wherewith ye dress’d the Christmas Hall”
— Robert Herrick (1591–1674), “Ceremony upon Candlemas Eve”

As another evidence of “racial memory” I took the Christmas cards down and said a prayer asking for blessings on the people who sent the cards.

The Saint of February 1 is Brigid of Kildare. Coincidentally, the name of the Celtic goddess, Brigid. In Ireland the old Celtic traditions are mixed with the newer ones of the Christian era.

Wikipedia quotes from a book by Marian McNeil, The Silver Bough:

One folk tradition that continues in both Christian and Pagan homes on St. Brigid’s Day (or Imbolc) is that of the Brigid’s Bed. The girls and young, unmarried women of the household or village create a corn dolly to represent Brigid, called the Brideog (”little Brigid” or “young Brigid”), adorning it with ribbons and baubles like shells or stones. They make a bed for the Brideog to lie in. On St. Brigid’s Eve (January 31), the girls and young women gather together in one house to stay up all night with the Brideog, and are later visited by all the young men of the community who must ask permission to enter the home, and then treat them and the corn dolly with respect

And far to the West, Native Americans revere the Corn Maiden: The presence of corn as a spiritual symbol can often be seen in the hands of the “Yeh” spirit figures represented in Navaho rugs, in the rituals associated with the “Corn Maiden” and other Kachinas of the Hopi, and in various fetish objects of tribes of the region. (source Wikipedia)  Small world, isn’t it?

Coral or Jade Anniversary Mr. Pyrate and I celebrated our 35th anniversary yesterday. We went to see “Avatar” in 3D. I do enjoy flying dragon creatures!I’m still at the “whoa- what was that?” stage.
I think it’s going to change film making forever. I’ve already heard that the Harry Potter final films will now be 3D. What will come someday is a completely digital movie with stars past or present: so the virtual Clark Gable will appear opposite Catherine Zeta Jones and so on. It will be wild!

Happy 74th Birthday to Alan Alda.
It’s the 24th anniversary of the sad, shocking day the Shuttle Challenger blew up.
Today is the feast day of St. Thomas Aquinas, who lived in the 13th Century.

I’m reading Stonehenge by Bernard Cornwell. It’s interesting, and reminds me of a James Michener novel, or certainly Sarum by Edward Rutherfurd- another good book about the establishment of Stonehenge and the ancient people. Stonehenge right now is at what I call the “Mugg and Ugg” stage. I’m not sure if they’re Pre or Post Ice Age people, but Humanity has progressed to where people live in tribal groups, raise a few domestic animals and the guys all aspire to be fierce warriors. They’re always sacrificing somebody to their gods- primarily the Sun and Moon.

I won’t be able to do this next month….but so far, with the new KitchenAid, I have made: oatmeal raisin cookies, bread, lime triangles, chocolate cookies, sugar cookies and pumpkin bread! I better start making angel food cake! Oh Pyrate and I hooked up the grinder attachment and fed it lean round beef, which we used to make a delicious meat loaf!

Top Secret Crochet Project—I’m about 20% done, so all is well there.

Knitting Jean of Jean’s Knitting has been making the effort to knit from her stash. Always a good idea.  Every needleworker has one. I have more than one. I have enough Cross Stitching stuff to keep me busy until 2025! Well, the yarn supply has been increasing here. I’ve got a backlog of sock yarn. So, at the very least, I’m going to knit up some socks before I buy any more yarn!

I’m in the home stretch! I finished the first sock back before Thanksgiving and i’ve been noodling around, not progressing with the second sock. This is known as Second Sock Syndrome. It seems to happen when the sock pattern is repetitive and boring. Still, the Pyrate needs socks. I want to move on to exciting new patterns with some neat-o yarn I have in the stash.  I’ll keep plugging away on the sensible gray socks. I kind of like this yarn- it looks “snake-y”

Note to Joan : I still look forward to and read your blog. I haven’t got around to setting up a Google or Open ID, which is why I haven’t said much lately.

Pyrates Hand: The operation he had last April didn’t take care of the problem. He hurts all the time these days. There is an operation which severs the nerve and “buries it in the bone”. Trouble with that is, he’ll lose the feeling in his thumb. He’s an electronics technician- hand work and all that! So, the next thing to do, is see another hand specialist and explore treatments which don’t involved taking his thumb out of commission.

I took this interesting quiz. I knew I’m not the fittest athlete in town for durn shure. My numbers reflect that I don’t have a lot of relatives (many have passed) and, being sort of retired and living in the country, I’m not a social butterfly. It’s okay, I love my loved ones a lot!

Spiritual quest, eh? I’ve been meaning to read the Bhagavad Gita

This Is My Life, Rated
Life:	5.7
Mind:	5.8
Body:	5.3
Spirit:	6.8
Friends/Family:	4.7
Love:	7.3
Finance:	6.3
Take the Rate My Life Quiz

Today I’m making up a Meme of FOOD I can’t get anymore and now and then a craving hits me.  If you want to play along, make a list of 10 items and the reason you haven’t satified this culinary craving in a long time.

1. Fresh Halibut - my Dad would go on fishing trips and bring home a flattie now and then- delicious! I could add Rock Cod to this list too.

2. XLNT Tamales- just because they’re not sold in this part of the country. Once my cousin froze some and I brought them home on the plane. What a treat!

3. Diedesheimer Hofstuck Kabinett- Rhine Wine It’s just really excellent wine, and I haven’t seen any in stores for years.

4.Douglas Burger More California food nostalgia- just an awesome burger joint in my home town.

5. Callard and Bowsers Celebrated Butterscotch It was the best stuff. Imported from the UK. Rectangles of butterscotch, wrapped in that paper foil used for ciggie packages. C & B is now a division of a bigger corporation and they make Altoids, but not the butterscotch!

6.Bonomo Turkish Taffy It was great stuff! Came in all kinds of flavors. You could put it in the fridge and then take it out and give it a whack on the table and have broken up taffiness!

7. Bubble Up “Kiss of Lemon- Kiss of Lime” Oh where are you now?

8.Fruit Flavored Certs Think about it- when is the last time you saw a roll of Certs?  Lots of Altoids though.

9.Santa Rosa Plums They are soooooo good. I just don’t see them in the store.-

10 “Classic” Dennison’s Chili- canned ambrosia  Best served with those Tamales listed above. The last time I bought some, it wasn’t the same- there was vegetable protein, i.e., soy added to the recipe- YUCK!  But hey, if they come out with “Throwback” chili, with the original recipe, somebody tell me!

that we don’t?

It’s a weird Winter. We had a BIG snow on December 19- before the official first day of Winter. We have had a fair number of bitterly cold days. Thankfully, the last week or so, it’s been warmer and okay as winters go.

Earlier this week, I saw three big flocks of geese flying North and West. Honking away like “Winter’s Over- let’s head for the breeding grounds!” Today at the bird feeders, I had grackles hanging out. Usually we get flocks of them in February. They’re early. Biggest surprise of all was one lone Mockingbird today. They don’t usually drop in here until May.

I think I’ve figured it out…..there’s bad weather South of Maryland.I heard something on the news about tornadoes in Texas and Tennessee. Well, I’d expect such things in March, so they’re early too. Maybe these visitors are Southerners trying to get warm(er) and dry? I wonder if they’ll hang around, or head back South when it’s all over?

Along with the News and the gossip bloggers, I check the USGS Maps of earthquake activity fairly often. For the last few years, I’ve had a feeling that ol’ Mother Earth is going through massive changes. It’s not very scientific, just a feeling I have.

When I heard about the earthquake in Haiti last week my first thought was, ‘those people are really poor….they’re going to need help” Poor in ways average Americans have never experienced. Haiti is like one of the poorest countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, just a cruise ship’s ride away from the US Mainland.

Today the magnitude of the loss of life, hit me. They’re estimating 200,000 dead now, and likely to go higher. That’s loss of life on a par with the Asian earthquake-tsunami, which was huge and affected 14 countries.
So this earthquake in the nation comprising one-third of the island of Hispaniola, population around 10 million, is going to go down in history in the top ten of planetary natural disasters.
In places like Japan and California, knowing that earthquakes happen, there are building codes in place….nothing like that existed in Haiti. I think most of this loss of life is being caused by poverty- not the earthquake.

Makes my heart lighter somehow….

This is my Father’s world,
and to my listening ears
all nature sings, and round me rings
the music of the spheres.
This is my Father’s world:
I rest me in the thought
of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;
his hand the wonders wrought.

This is my Father’s world,
the birds their carols raise,
the morning light, the lily white,
declare their maker’s praise.
This is my Father’s world:
he shines in all that’s fair;
in the rustling grass I hear him pass;
he speaks to me everywhere.

This is my Father’s world.
O let me ne’er forget
that though the wrong seems oft so strong,
God is the ruler yet.
This is my Father’s world:
why should my heart be sad?
The Lord is King; let the heavens ring!
God reigns; let the earth be glad!
-Maltbie Babcock

I have to tell ya: after MUCH ado, Chez Dorie now has a KitchenAid! I’ve been wanting one, but shopping around for the best deal. As kitchen equipment goes, it’s a major purchase. Finally in exasperation with me, Mr. Pyrate said, “Dorie we’ve bought CARS in less time- just get the *&^%! mixer” Well, he had a point. But then, which model? Again, he said, “when has anybody ever said they wanted a smaller one with less power? Get the big one.” He’s smart that way (makes me hopeful he’ll get me my Cadillac one of these days too!) So here’s a picture of the Super Duper new mixer I also had a terrible time picking a color. Since this model comes with a metallic finish I decided to approach the choice as I would picking a color of a car. I liked the copper pearl color best; reminds me of my cousin’s ‘64 Pontiac come to think of it!

So here at the Ridge, I’ve been baking up a storm. Pyrate got me a Taste of Home Baking Book from the library. From that, I made “Golden Raisin Oatmeal” cookies- delicious, chewy with a hint of orange. Then, with those lovely limes, I made the recipe for “Lime Triangles” which was in the December issue of “Good Housekeeping” I added some chopped almonds which were part of the lime triangle recipe in the Taste of Home cookbook!

Today I made bread. I’m not ready to give up on my faithful bread machine just yet, so I made the dough in it. It’s my basic country white recipe and I made some buns for sandwiches. I found a new ingredient, which is why I brought it up. Bob’s Red Mill makes this multi-grain hot cereal mix, with all kinds of whole grain, even triticale! So I replaced 2/3 c. of flour with this mix. Much healthier than plain old white bread!

In the mixer, I made cookies! Todays are a variation on a chocolate cherry thumbprint cookie I make from time to time. I was searching the web and saw this cookie at Cafe Fernando Looks delicious, but I decided to deviate a bit from Fernando’s basic recipe. I added an egg to the sugar and butter. And instead of chopped chocolate, I used Nestle’s mini morsels (2/3 c) and 1/2 c. chopped walnuts. I rolled the cookies about 1″ in diameter and pressed one maraschino cherry in each one. They came out like little brownies with a cherry on top- wonderful!

Memo for next week: find the Cooking Light book of baking!

Topic Drift! Did you watch the finale of Doctor Who? What did you think?

Look how pretty:

I bought these on impulse at the grocer’s yesterday. Now I realize my cooking expertise with limes has been limited to green Jello and Seven-Up! What to make? Cookies, Pie and Cheesecake? I need it like a moose needs a hatrack. I see a lot of recipes call for a lime mayonaise or cilantro sauce- yummy! Or, packed in the “emergency, disaster, snowstorm” supplies, there’s a bottle of Vodka….doesn’t one of the Collins boys (Tom and John) call for lime juice?

Meanwhile, the loverly limes sit on the table reminding me that somewhere South of here, it’s ain’t Winter. Very reassuring!

Want to know how cold it is?

I just read a news report regarding turtle rescues going on in coastal waters of the normally warmer Southern US. The ocean temperature is in the 40s in some places, and the sea turtles float to the surface, stressed and lethargic from the cold.
The rescuers bring them in, float them in warmer water, and administer IVs of warm fluids if that’s what it takes to bring them around.

Oy, what a year. Put on your Cuddle-Duds and turn the thermostat down- we’ve got two more months of this to go!