Life of Wry

I should hire myself out as a Christmas planner. Not really, but I am good at this.

About two decades ago, I came up with a Christmas to-do list. I work from it every year. I refine it every year, as well, so you gotta know it’s a pretty awesome document.

Every year I also shake my head and mutter things like, It’s really come to this? Then I say, Yes, yes it has.  But most of the time, though slightly horrified by my own ocd, I think it’s pretty damn useful.

Yesterday was the day I pulled together this year’s list. I sat in Mishka’s with an extra large au lait, rain pelting the windows, and, using last year’s as a template, I entered and updated all the relevant data for this year’s list. It’s a bit of an annual ritual. An out with the old, in with the new kind of thing.

It’s 14 pages long.

Yep. That’s why I got the extra large.

Anyway. So today was the official Day 1: Get Supplies Day. I have a very specific list of the things I’m going to need … for baking, for cards, for gift baskets, for wrapping, for trimming and decorating. I assess current supplies, make a detailed list of what’s missing, then head out to acquire the stuff. I know the stores I’m going to go to and the specific supplies at each one. I know how many and how much I’m going to need of just about everything because I do pretty much the exact same thing every year. That was the deal I made with myself a long time ago:  “You can do it easy, or you can do it hard. Choose easy.”

(Actually, page one of my 14-page Christmas list is this nice little 5-point strategy slash pep talk that I devised many years ago and quickly review most years to remind myself that It’s. Just. Christmas. The points are all about keeping the holiday simple and fun. I know…. it’s a list of things I do to manage my list of things to do. But hey, it works. You have to get all the logistical business out of the way so you can slow it up, enjoy your peeps, and nestle down into the season of peace and light. Right?)

It was funny today… I rarely shop at Office Max, but I always go at Christmas time to get four boxes of a certain self-sticking envelope in a variety of colors. I know exactly where I’m going to find them. As I was walking down that aisle, I was thinking, Jeeez, I was JUST here! And indeed, it felt like it had been only a couple of months ago, but, in fact, it’s been a year. Time doing that time thing.

So… supply acquisition day went well. We are provisioned and ready for business.

Mostly, it was a STUNNINGLY beautiful day in Northern California. I took a few pics…

Managed to get a parking spot on G, south of Second. Pickin’s were slim on a Friday afternoon!

Came out of the toy store (I actually had some extra time to shop and got 5 1/2 out of 7 of the little kid presents… yay!):

Walking out of Office Max in South Davis…

And driving home along 8th…

The season of light has begun.

Weekend tasks: tree chopping down… trimming and decorating if there’s time, and card and calendar making.

This happened:

I heard a weather guy on the radio this morning saying it was going to be a perfect little California winter storm. Nothing fancy…. just straight forward and productive. And it was.

Later, this happened:

As seen this late afternoon (while leaving work early due to nothing to work on).

And then, continuing the theme of I can’t seem to pour stuff into my intended vessels, this happened:

Now, don’t laugh, but this was me pouring a bunch of chocolate chips into a ramekin for a post dinner snack… (aka dessert, except I’d already eaten dessert). It’s a real effort. I just missed. I was as surprised as the next guy.

If you spend as much time as Jim and I do (especially Jim) at a certain local eatery (Crepeville, of course), shiny new things (like teapots) are pretty exciting.

This was my vessel today for apricot tea:

New…shiny… but not so easy to use, it would seem.  I spilled boiling hot tea water all over the table, when it was actually my cup I was aiming for. (Should you order tea at Crepeville, and should it come in one of their new teapots, I suggest you lift that little doohicky at the end of the spout.)

Once I figured out how to work the thing, it was GREAT. Gonna be a nice winter tea season.

We enjoyed Emmy’s pulled pork sandwiches so much while in Florida, Jim decided to try making them himself…

Jim first made some BBQ sauce:

Combine 2 c of catsup; 1 c water; 1/2 c apple cider vinegar; 5 T each of white and brown sugar; 1/2 T each of pepper, onion powder and ground mustard; 1 T each of lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce. Bring all that to a boil, then simmer uncovered for 1 hour and 15 mins.

Then…

Put a 4 lb shoulder cut of pork into slow cooker with a tsp of oil. Add a cup of the BBQ sauce and 1/2 cup each of vinegar and chicken broth.  Then add 1/4 cup of brown sugar; a tablespoon each of yellow mustard, Worcestershire sauce and chili powder; a large chopped onion; a couple crushed garlic cloves; and a tsp and a half of thyme. Cook on high for 5-6 hours. Voila!

Serve on a hamburger bun.

They tasted very different than Emmy’s, but were still good!

Jim and Peter have given the UC college application a final review….

… plunked down a credit card for $490, and clicked the submit button!

Seven down (actually eight down, as he submitted an app to Cal Poly SLO a week and a half ago) and seven to go. He’s got a couple of reach schools to go, a couple of safety schools, and a handful of good bets. UCs are definitely the prominent prospects.

He likes the lots of options approach.

Lots of emotions for me. Like wow! our little kiddo just applied to college. COLLEGE. We’ve been watching this significant, if daunting, milestone approach for years and here it is. It’s huge and something you really want for your kid. And… it signals the end of a major chapter in all of our lives, the living together chapter, the the way it’s always been chapter.

Sniff.

And now, we wait.

Who’s there?

You see.

You see who?

UC that I finished my college application? (!!)

It’s late on the eve of the deadline… but he did it.

He’d finished most of the application a couple weeks ago. The most labor intensive part of the application, the essays–there were two–were finished a couple weeks ago, but he wanted to tweak them just a little, and that was all that remained. Thought we’d wrap this up early and go to bed.

However, as we were reviewing the application to make sure everything was complete and accurate, we discovered an optional question toward the end–something like, “Is there anything else you’d like to tell us about yourself?” This was a 550-word opportunity we maybe shouldn’t pass up, an opportunity to expand on some aspect of Peter’s high school experience, or  add something that wasn’t already included, or just generally leave them with a more complete story of who Peter is– beyond grades and test scores.

He texted a friend to find out if he had answered the question. He had not, claiming it made you seem too desperate.

We all talked about it. Jim made a compelling case for highlighting Peter’s life-long obsession with mountain climbing.

He was game and got to work.

What’s more, he was open to my reading and commenting on his essay. I was pretty pleased about that! (Very impressed, too, with what he wrote.) Definitely good mom-son time.. which was great because it’d been a stressful day of his procrastinating and our walking that desperate line between needing to push him to complete the application and wanting him to take responsibility for his own damn college apps.

Anyway, he was in a very good place when the final essay writing began and it was a productive and actually fun few hours.

He finished around 2:00am and screen-shotted the above pic (then started his calculus and government homework.. ugh). I went to bed.

Super happy the application is done. Will review it one last time tomorrow before sending it in….

Got in late last night, woke early (still on Florida time) and walked, coldly, to Farmer’s Market.

Some shots:

Watched this crow foraging for bugs under the bark and leaves of this sycamore just above our bench in the plaza…

The market was all fallish… and so, so nice:

A stop at Davis Bread and Desserts…

To get Peter his usual elfinear (Elephant Ear, aka cinnamon crisp):

Ran into Larry, and ended up spending an hour with him… very nice!

Another shot on the way to the Coop…

And one of my favorite trees in Davis. Saddle up!

Loving this weather.

… the whole nine enchiladas!

(My new favorite mixed metaphor… I’m planning on using it a lot.)

Marty, Teresa, Jim, Peter and I dropped the senior Frames off at the Palm Beach airport (nice) (where Peter saw a Trump plane on the tarmac… maybe THE Trump plane, maybe with THE Trump in it). Then we had a couple of hours to pass before J, P and I needed to head back to Miami to catch our flight… so, Marty suggested a quickie driving tour of the island.

Palm Beach is kind of a monied place. I did not know this. We got a good look at a lot of it, and now I have a pretty good picture in my mind of what it means when someone says they live in Palm Beach.  The rich, the famous…who knew? The celebrity list of people living there is pretty impressive.

As we approached the island from West Palm Beach (on the mainland), we saw the usual yachts and boats bobbing in the marina…

And this is a lovely, thickly-planted Palm-lined boulevard once you’ve arrived on the island…

Beautifully manicured golf courses…

Couldn’t help notice the kind of cars parked outside the Breakers Hotel, there were Rolls Royces, Jaguars, Teslas, Peugeots…

Here’s the Breakers Hotel out the back window as we are driving away:

Drove along Ocean Blvd…

The beach is public, but access points are often not, as each of the mansions–to the right in the above picture–has its own private access. The beach, as seen from the road, is gorgeous…

 The above two shots were taken from our jeep.

We did find a public access access point and Peter and I ventured out…

At least got to dip our feet into the warm Atlantic…

Here he’s glaring at me…it’s a long story:

Then we drove through some of the neighborhoods off Ocean Blvd, wending our way back to the commercial district. These houses were more modest but spectacular nonetheless. Seems sharply trimmed hedges are a thing on Palm Beach:

And trees trimmed with careful precision, too!

We came, saw, and gawked.. then left…

Drove south on I-95 through Boco Raton, Ft. Lauderdale. On the way, we passed the Swimming Hall of Fame and another, maybe the Fishing Hall of Fame….

…Reflecting, we concluded Florida is a lot about boating (yachting, speed boating), golfing, tennis, equestrian life (Wellington, particularly, had numerous equestrian venues, as well as the Equestrian Hall of Fame… in fact, I read Bill Gates has a house in Wellington because his daughter is a horse girl), palm trees, beaches, nightclubs, light blue water, white sand, islands galore, bright green vegetation as far as the eye can see, air conditioning, alligators, banana spiders, Cuban culture, youth who dress fabulously, retirees who want to live their days out in the easy warmth, snowbirds who escape the New York winters, celebrities and wealthy people with a crazy amount of money and the desire to spend it lavishly, deco, pastels… and palmetto bugs. We also know there’s Disney World and Epcot and the Kennedy Space Center and the everglades… so we’re glad Marty is settling there so we can visit again. In the winter.

Anyway… after about an hour and a half, got to Miami Internat’l airport.

The Miami airport’s huge… here’s a shot of some neato windows…

We left 70-degrees, and hit cold weather at LAX. We were again shuttled from some remote terminal to the Tom Bradley terminal, not sure why. We boarded outside, not sure why. American Airline is a mystery… pleasant enough customer service, but no meals, pay for luggage, check in and tag your own luggage, and some nutty terminal arrangements. But all fine.

Our plane in LA…

By the time we got to Sac, the temps had dropped even more.. down to the low 40s and dropping. Waiting for the Davis Airporter in the frigid temperatures was an effective and convincing selling point for visiting Florida again in the winter.

Turns out Thanksgiving in Florida is kind of exactly like Thanksgiving just about anywhere I’ve ever had it. Mostly.

You got your Thanksgiving day electrical project:

Your football:

Your too many cooks in the kitchen:

That would be Connie, Justin, Elisa, Jim, Emmy, Alexis, Marty and Figaro.

And then we have Emmy, the most casual of cooks:

Your napping:

(I have the best napping picture ever, but promised not to post it to my blog. I’ll leave it to your imagination, but it’s great.)

Your favorite holiday dishes: I got to make my favorite cranberry sauce, which I might have to admit I’m addicted to:

You make whole berry cranberry sauce more or less the usual way, but substitute OJ for water and add some orange zest and rosemary. Killer.

Your group-around-the-table shot:

Jim, Jim Sr, Elisa, Justin, Connie, Alexis, Martin, Emmy, Teresa and Peter.

And maybe another because it’s hard to see faces in the table shot:

The patriarch, his three kids, a wife, a daughter-in-law and a grandson.

And of course…your desserts:

…which, because it’s both a birthday party and a traditional Thanksgiving day feast, include the lowly (but exceptional) pumpkin and pecan pies–made this morning–and a pair of not-so-lowly birthday cakes… a five-layer red velvet chocolate cake from the Fountainebleau and the aforementioned three-layer German chocolate cake made last night.  This whole scene reminded me of a Thiebaud still life.

~ ~ ~

And I’m not kidding; everyone went to bed at 9:15. It’s just me and the dogs… me working under a single kitchen table light in an otherwise dark house… Melanie by my feet and Figaro snoozing in the shadow.

Night. Zzzzzzzz…..

…and all through the house…people were cooking, and talking, and shopping… the usual pre-feast day preparations. Tomorrow’s more than the traditional TG thing because it’s also Martin’s 60th birthday, and the reason we are here. So we had birthday prep, as well. And we also had dinner for seven to whip together.

Lots of bustling about!

Jim did the lion’s share of work on a German Chocolate Cake–Marty’s birthday choice.

Marty even helped:

I like this picture because it’s got the senior Frame in the background and Mellie–ever, EVER underfoot–in the foreground.

It’s a three-layer tower of chocolate sweetness… here are the three stories laid out:

Here’s how it finally turned out. Best three-layer cake effort ever!

Continuing on the food theme…

Dinner was pulled pork sliders, coleslaw and baked beans. Incredible. Take a pork butt (aka shoulder), rub it with herbs and spices and let it sit a couple of days in the refrigerator. Then slow bake it for about eight hours, remove it, and proceed to pull it off bone with a pair of forks. Tender, shredded, immensely flavorful meat. Put on small buns with sweet BBQ sauce. Ridiculously good.

Here’s Teri doing the pull apart part:

Here’s the dinner spread:

Peter and I snuck out for a nice long walk, in search of one of these residential lakes everyone seems to live on out here in Wellington. Found one:

Martin’s house is across the street from lakeshore houses, which is okay with him.. he’s got a pool. People also live along canals, which are also everywhere. You just can’t get any more different than California:

No alligators, but you’re supposed to keep an eye out for water moccasins. I also think I may have seen a flamingo.

By the way, today’s high, about 75. Low will be 70. Humidity about 80%.