Clandestine Valentine

I was excited that Hubby's V-Day gift to me was a good old-fashioned housecleaning while I slaved away at work. I figured I'd be able to come home, celebrate the holiday, take a little Valentine photoshoot with Jimmy, eat lots of rich food, all of it--until I arrived to find that same Valentiney Hub shoving a giant load firewood into the house, announcy-griping that the Toddlrz had spent the prior 11 hours with zero hours napping, and advising off-hook ringing phones that he would "be there in a minute."

Well, then. That's some Valentine's Day. After watching my Valentine rush out the front door for band practice, and watching our romantic woodstove fire eat more of my formerly heart-shaped pupils as I watched my little Valentine Blog Model crushing for me crashing out on me, I wondered 'How Could I V-Win??' Didn't my Valentines realize that it's Olympic Couples Skating tonight???

When I realized...I was probably the only one who wanted to watch Olympic Couples Skating, and that I had a wealth of firewood, a sleeping toddler, and a content hubby who wasn't next to me making all kinds of "comments." In this valentine-vacuumed house. Wow. Happy Valentine's Day to ME!!!

And to you.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Olympic Meal Dining

As we wait for the opening ceremonies in Vancouver, Jimmy chooses to celebrate with one of his favorite winter-warmy meals: Peanut Butter Oatmeal.



He opts for a somewhat offbeat technique: spoonless.





Notice how he sports the remnants of Blueberry Smoothie on his shirt from cross-training in the Parade of Rations.



Happy Olympics, All!

Go, ..... Sports!

I used to really really hate sports until I started getting harassed with spite and virulence for my devotion for CBS's Big Brother and then realized that Reality TV Season Finales were kinda/really like sports sfinales (or whatever they're called) so I started to embrace the sentiments of following and supporting regional teams, getting all riled up, relaxing in front of the tv, etc. Today was the Super Bowliday so we got some snacks together and watched The Who, and the game/sorta.





I came into the situation rookie-rooting for the Saints because I thought it was "the right thing to do" and naturally assumed that my naturally "right thing to do" hubby was on the same team...until I started blabbering about Saintsy stuff that I knew nothing about when I detected some Saints-resistaince. I was shocked; didn't my jazzluvin' quasiblack hubby want Katrina to win(lose)??? He then admitted he was torn, over conferences. Whaaah? That's how much I know, but happy that I'm married to someone who can still surprise me. Go Sports!



And congrats to the New Orleans Saints.

32 Inches of Inspiration

After accessing my bank account this morning a sigh of dereliefium was enough to wake up everyone in the house, I finally got to read the digits of the first paycheck from my new part-time schedule, they came out better than what I was hoping. (I wasn't sure with all the deductions, whether they'd let me keep my weekend shift differential, etc.) I decided to celebrate with a round of TV-Inspired Items from Whole Foods.

First up was easy:



Earth's Best French Toast Sticks. Featuring every child's favorite licensed red character: Lightning McQueen. I mean Clifford. Um, Muno. Po. Spiderman?

Second item is the bad part, because it forces me to admit that I was watching the very, very redundantly redundant, repetitive repetitive non-loquacious, non-loquacious Ma-har-tha Stew-hew-art...but it was only a brief clip and it was sort of inspirational about:



Quinoa, for breakfast (I'd never thought of it for that!) and it got me thinking about getting this supergrain into the men of the house, using my own personal secret agent: Sugar.

Third, my favorite (and Wally's) Celebratory TV-Inspired Whole Food Item is:



The Chocolate Babka. I had never heard of a chocolate babka before or since one was featured on The Dinner Party episode of Seinfeld. Sometimes I miss the 90s. :::wistfulness:::

And that wraps up my 5-day weekend, back to work tomorrow. My new schedule is working out pretty well, Jimmy couldn't be happier. Whole Paycheck Foods appreciates it too! (I know, cheesy, I've used that strikethru "paycheck" joke before, but just in case...) In the meantime, may the tv be with you.

Haiti

Ah geez. It's hard to celebrate daily life when so many parts of it are flanked by the Haitian earthquake tragedy.

We were excited to celebrate Christoph Waltz's win:



And the nomination of Jimmy's ne'er-to-be-born sibling's namesake, Daniel Day- Wenzel Lewis.



We also celebrated fellow Southern Mainahs:



Anna Kendrick of Up in the Air and of the high school I hated many times,



and Glenn Close and her labby hubby.

We also luv'd watching Martin Scorsese being honored, and look forward to the OSCARS. =D

Yet, there is still the Haitan tragedy. Maya Angelou said it all: "I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better." Now that we know five dollars helps lives , we know our options.

2009, A Year Of...

Facebook tonight is full of people commenting on 2009 being a great year, or a bad year, a healthy year, or a year of struggles. Happiness in early spring, only to meet year's end with a big bang of woe. A year of pride, a year of shame. I dunno, I never remember things by "year" like that. The shit I'm experiencing now is going to continue into...tomorrow, right. 2010, right. Every year is a year of moderate health and reasonable poverty, right. 2009 was just the same I guess, I don't really remember.

BUT....

I DO remember our annual NYE pre-Wally Leaves For Work buffet. Why, I even have photos!


Tomato and Olive Aspic


Aspic with Kickass-Kugel, Panettone, Nuts


Holiday Lutefisk!


Th'olthang

Stuffed and geared up for a new year of...idunno. Happy New Year!

'Twis the Night After Christmas

It was a Magical Christmas for 2009. A brief relay:



After opening Christmas morning pressies with Uncle Mark and Aunt M, we had a relaxing baba with, you guessed it, the FUTURE PRESIDENT.



After that I opened an email from, you guessed it, the CURRENT PRESIDENT. "A Historic Vote" it was titled, and evidently was part of a group email as the Boston Globe reports on how Obama calls the Senate vote "historic", but for me the Christmas Magic is that I have a president who doesn't put the word "an" in front of a noun that starts with consonant, and that Anne Heche might be completing her civic and patriotic duties, like I insisted she must. Thanks, Anne! Merry Christmas!

Then, food.


Hickory Smoked Duck, Lamb Pie (a la The Hours), and My Good Cranberry Jello (it's not Christmas without my good cranberry jello--but I'm the only one who seems to think so!)


Figgy Pudding


Munchies


Salmon Mousse


Timpano, a la Big Night


Bûche de Noël with Meringue Mushrooms


The Bottom of the Glögg

And visitors, and gifts!




Jimmy's Grampy made him this stool


...they also brought the singing snowfamily that Jimmy's been playing with all day. "DONG! Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Treee......



DONG!"

Possibly the biggest piece of Christmas Magic:

My father got them to remove the extra A from this kickasserole dish! Amazing! And quite the crowd pleezer, even for those (many) at the party who don't read this blog. I can't wait to fill it with bonafide kickasseroles though I must admit, it puts on the pressure! :practice:practice:practice:

Today, the 26th I'd like to wish my Aunt Betty a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

We spent the day chillaxing and I asked the Magic 8 Ball "Could there be anything cuter than this?"





And it said:


I rechecked, and got a little spooked when it said:



Why, yes that was Figgy Pudding that Jimmy was eating on his new Thomas stool, how did Magic 8 Ball know that? Another shake:



Ok, that was enough. Magic ball gone now (and without any figgy pudding.) I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday. Now it's on to New Year's and then: months and months of winter! Yaaaaay.

The 8th of the Month

It's the 8th of the month, the day of trepidation as my fingers boldy address the keyboard while my breaths tread but gingerly as I log into my online banking account, then I cross those fingies in anticipation that the $$$ total of my account is $xxx.xx less than it was the day before. It's the day the mortgage company withdraws our mortgage payment, with escrow, the day my math doesn't bounce, the monthly tradition of breathing a sigh of relief and reassuring myself "they're gonna let us live here for another month."

This month's 8 marks a special occasion, it's the five year anniversary that we bought this house. Happy housey-versary to us!!! 60 payments! Only a mere 300 to go! We are stylin'!!!

To celebrate the Special Day, I found some "BEFORE" photos of the house we bought, and some reasons why we quickly wondered "RALLLLPPPHHH????"









The best (only) compliments we ever got were on the Home Depot general issue front door. Oh yes, our champagne glasses refused to ching that night, instead we founded the anti-ching along with a determination to make things better.

My wonderful husband has worked wonders on this house, a home that keeps presenting me with frequent treasures even today--this evening was the first time it registered in my ickle head that in the non-leafy months we can see The Eastland from the backyard of our urban suburban industrial municipal homestead.



See the red light! It's there. This delights the cosmopolitan cockleparts that still live in my wee heart. Happy Anniversary to us!

The Glamour of Voting

We had a big referendum here in the Maine State, we've been asked:

"Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"

Uh, noh.

I admit I normally only vote during the dramatic elections, when I get really excited over the whole process. I find it exciting to watch the live news updates and to rustle through the leaves and to register for my forms and to resonate the buzz of democracy off others. Even better is when the voting place is a flashy, alluring, impressive location--I used to live in the district that voted at City Hall, with the gorgeous winding marble staircase. Then I moved to district that voted at the local school and since I hadn't been in one in a million years I enjoyed getting a peek into that world. Last year I found it very intriguing to vote in a synagogue, how exotic! This year I received word that we would have a new voting location and I was getting excited about either the Italian Heritage Center (ethnic and fun!) or the Expo (easy walk, chance to check out the house of our new minor league basketball team!) so my anticipation fizzled a little (lot) when I read that we'd be voting at...Woodfords Congregational Church.

How Vanilla!

I suppose it's just as well, seeing as I still can't update with photos, but once we were back in the car I was surprised to hear "That room was awesome!" out of my hubby--especially after we'd overheard a little girl ask if Jimmy was The Baby Jesus. Evidently he liked the high ceilings, the stage, the curtains, etc. in the church's function room. The room didn't leave as big an impression on me, but I was still feeling festive with the 3 of us in our I Voted stickers so I suggested celebrating by going out to eat, and we ate like normal Americans, at Ruby Tuesday's in a strip mall. Very glamorous!!!

And now I can only sit back and wait for the votes to be counted. Happy Election Day!

Birthday Shoutout

This is to wish my father a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!



And a video of Jimmy making the birthday present for his Grampy. It's taken days to dry, but the artist felt he needed to use *just* the perfect amount of paint.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!! Apologies for not being able to celebrate it with you. The rat and the rac fly at midnight!

36.5 Candles

Tomorrow a coworker turns 50. Everyone is bringing in foodstuffs and decorations and goodcheer, the works.

I'm bringing in mini-quiches...




...and a smile even though no one cares or will acknowledge the fact that tomorrow also happens to be my 36.5th birthday. No, it's OK, I realize some people's birthdays are more "important" than others. I'm not bitter. Some parties just prefer to be non-inclusive, right. No universal healthcare, right...pass the fudge, right.

Food Field Trip: Kon Asian Bistro

One shan't write a blog in this town without an inexplicable post about inaugural trips to Kon Asian Bistro. My turn, my turn! I wanted to find out why this weird place was the belle of the GWI/RoadRunner ball so I chose it for our Paid In Full celebratory meal.

As we say in Maine, I was stahvin' on Saturday so we piled in the car when I got home from work and we dug a hole to the other end of Brighton Ave.


Exit 8-y


Valle's Redux


Budda-Swank!

The club lighting indoors made me sorry we hadn't waited until after dark to enjoy the seriously tricked-out interior. We were seated and then I chased after Jimmy as our request for a highchair was ignored. This left me no time to look at the menu but that was OK because I knew what I wanted, until the waitress advised me they didn't serve Lo Mein ??!? so I ended up ordering a Veggie Pad Thai, a booster seat, and a Kirin Draft. "Oh, sorry, we don't have draft beer yet." Argg!!! Kirin in a bottle it was.





When the waitress came back with Jimmy's booster and my Kirin we learned that the urchin that Wally ordered was also unavailable. Insert italicized question marks and exclamation points?!!?

They did have eel.




And jerry-rigged chopsticks for kids.




My Pad Thai got nicely tasty with some soy sauce.




And Jimmy enjoyed the rice from Wally's duck.



But Wally thought his duck was going to appear more assembled like a duck, and less disassembly (he prefers to eat meat off the bone.)



There were a few bumps in the road however things definitely were tasty and despite our suspicion that many of our fellow patrons were employees of the Adult Donut Shop down the street, we considered this location to be much kid-friendlier than some of the better places in town AND Kon has the added benefit of not being anywheres near the mall. We rarely go out to eat so only time will tell if we give another look-see at Kon's uniquely luxurious and lowgrade bistro...or if I get konned into patronizing other weird businesses just because I wanted to see what the bloggy fuss was about.