Category Archives: Splashes

Snow Days

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Driftwood Santa

The past few days, with our neighborhood shrouded in ice and the air temperatures legitimately cold and not just “cold for Texas,” have felt like snow days, even though we don’t have kids and work from home, and probably wouldn’t have done much outside the house this weekend, anyway.

The thing is though, a really good snow day exists outside time, as if the Universe is granting you a bubble of sparkly white magic for you to exist within for a few hours, and in those hours there are several things that must occur:

  • You must drink hot chocolate. Whipped cream, marshmallows and peppermint-stick stirrers are all options that may or may not be added, but the hot chocolate itself is crucial.
  • There must be a dog, preferably two or three, to cuddle with, play with, coax outside for an elimination break, and lure back in when he/she/they figure out that whuffling snow is super-fun, only to dry (their paws) wait, and repeat.
  • Board games are required. If you are not alone on your snow day, you must gather whomever is present and play a board game, possibly two. Lately, we’ve been playing Gloom and Hunting Party a lot, but any board game will do. Yesterday we played Ticket to Ride: Europe.
  • A good book is essential. Snow days are perfect for curling up with a good book (bonus points if you manage to do the cocoa drinking, book curling-up-with, and dog-cuddling all at once) and getting lost in someone else’s life for a while. Because I’m perverse, I often like to read “beach” books in the dead of winter, and books with a winter setting in the heat of summer. That said, last year when we had an ice storm, I re-read The Long Winter, by Laura Ingalls Wilder.
  • Bad television reigns supreme. Yes, we have 450 or so channels, including every single premium movie channel known to technogeeks everywhere (although no Hallmark Channel, because Uverse.) Yes, we also have Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hulu Plus. But those SyFy Channel equivalent of “B” movies, the ones that typically include either John Rhys Davies or Robert Englund, bad CGI, and young actors who can’t, you know, act? Those are the perfect movies for Snow Days. (So are old musicals. The Court Jester got me through many a blizzard when I was a kid.)
  • Comfort food is key. To feed ourselves and our friends-turned-temporary-refugees during this ice storm our choices included macaroni and cheese (from scratch), chicken and sweet potato soup, homemade cinnamon bread, and black bean chili with homemade cornbread. We also had a pot of hot cider going most of the time.

As an adult, having a snow day you get to actually enjoy is a rare thing. I don’t miss wading through chest-high snow to get to school, only to find a sign saying, “Buses can’t get through, no school today,” as happened once or twice when we lived in Georgetown (school was only a block and a half away), but I do miss the freedom that came once I’d waded back home, greeted my mother, and stripped off my coat and boots.

Often, she’d put me to work in her store, putting price tags on things, or tidying things, but just as often, she’d make me a mug of cocoa and send me upstairs to my room with a book or two, and I would spend the day with my poodle mix warming my toes.

As I write this, the ice that melted off our roof is re-freezing, and I am sitting on the bed with two of the four dogs who currently live in this house. (The other two are in their crates for the night.) Tomorrow will be chilly, but regularly scheduled work will resume.

We’ve had our weekend of snow days, and it’s been lovely.

Even better? Unlike school children, we don’t have to make them up at the end of the year.

Today’s Santa: Another Cracker Barrel purchase, I bought him three years ago because he reminds me of something that might have been carved from drift wood.

Holidailies 2013

Movie Musings

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Biker Santa

My friend and fellow Holidailies participant, The Mighty Kymm, tagged me on Facebook with the challenge to list – without thinking about it – ten movies that have stayed with you.

I said I’d play, but that I’d make it my entry for tonight (late, as usual). So here’s my list, in no particular order:

  1. A Fish Called Wanda: It was a rainy night in San Francisco. I was eighteen, I was in school at USF, and we saw it at Opera Plaza, then went ghost hunting at the Lone Mountain campus. For weeks before and after, we referred to it as “A Fish Called Wanda Weekend.”
  2. Life Without Zoe: Another film I originally saw in San Francisco. It’s actually part of an anthology, New York Stories, but that segment is my favorite. Who wouldn’t want to live in a boutique hotel, have a famous flautist for a father, and go to schools with sheiks’ sons?
  3. Frankenstein: The original black and white film with Boris Karloff was my first horror movie – I was six or seven – and I remember having to sleep with my closet light on for weeks afterward. Ultimately,I became a really big horror movie fan.
  4. Shadow of the Vampire: John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe in a movie about the making of a vampire movie, starring a real vampire. Best line: “Don’t eat the writers.”
  5. The Lover: There was a lot of controversy when this film first came out, because it involves the affair between a 15-year-old girl and a 20-something man (though both lie about their ages). Jane March, who played the girl, had barely turned eighteen when filming began. It’s a quirky, arty film, but even though it’s really explicit, it’s also really well written, and beautifully shot.
  6. Midnight in Paris: I know it was everyone’s favorite thing of the summer when it came out a couple years ago, but it was everyone’s favorite for a reason. While it did not make me run off to Paris, it did remind me why I love to write.
  7. Marley & Me: Yes, it’s silly. Yes, the ending in sad. But I work in rescue, loved the book, and was still learning how to communicate with my first big dog, Max, when it came out.
  8. We Bought a Zoo: I didn’t read the book until after we’d taken my parents to see this for Christmas, which is good, because the film changes a lot. It also leaves the core of the story alone. My stepfather kept complaining about it – I think he was confusing it with some Zoo comedy – but by the end we were all teary. Btw, the book is amazing, and you should read it.
  9. Empire Records: This isn’t the world’s greatest film, but it always makes me happy. Also, it’s fun seeing the cast (Liv Tyler, Renee Zellweger, Ethan Embry) looking like babies (well, high school students).
  10. Little Women: The 1995 version is my favorite because it touched a little on transcendentalism, and I liked the casting, but I know a lot of other people hated it. But this is my list, and it’s one of the films I re-watch at least once a year. So, yeah.

Today’s Santa: An ornament that amused me, once upon a time.

DFW on Ice

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Butterfly

I’m posting at nearly-midnight again, but this time it’s because last nights sleet and freezing rain turned into this morning’s widespread power outages.

Our power glitched for a minute or so around one AM, but our friends who live less than a mile away have been without power, and, subsequently, without heat, since four this morning.

As today’s high temperature was around 29 degrees, we invited them to come here. And so they are tucked upstairs in one of the spare rooms, with their younger son and dog. Their older son chose to wrap himself in all the blankets and stay home with the cats.

And so we had an old fashioned snow day, listening to music, each working on a project, drinking hot cider.

I wish I had the energy to write something more interesting, but I’m exhausted, and cold (must go turn heat up.)

Happy Birthday, Maximus

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Max, age five

Oh, my dearest doggy, you are FIVE years old today. That’s middle-aged for a breed like yours, a breed we think is pointer/boxer, but could be most anything, really.

How well I remember that windy day in February, 2009 when we met your then-tiny little self. You were ten weeks old, and I kept telling Fuzzy we didn’t want a puppy, but he thought your black and white fur looked like your sister Cleo’s, and we knew Zorro didn’t have much more time with us.

I remember how Fuzzy snapped your picture through the bars of your crate at PetCo, and said, “Come see this puppy,” and I remember how the first time I picked you up you gnawed on my neck until you finally fell asleep in my arms.

I remember when you were so small you slept in a cat bed, and so tiny you couldn’t climb the stairs. You used to pick up Cleo’s leash and make her follow you around the house. You weren’t quite certain of what to do with Zorro, but he left us a week after you came. I think he waited to be sure you were right for us.

We didn’t always get along, my Maxi-taxi. You were my first big dog, and I had to learn a whole new language with you. It wasn’t until you were three months old that I knew we’d be alright. You’d escaped from your crate, and even though Fuzzy’s side of the bed was closer, you came right to me, and put your cold wet nose in my hand. I knew, then, that you were MY dog, just like Zorro and Cleo had been. Perry had joined us by then, but he’s never as obvious about who his people are as you always have been.

In the first year of your life, you ate rocks and razor blades, water bottles, entire pairs of Keds, and more paper towels than I care to count. Once, I even found you chewing on the side of the house! I was convinced something you’d swallowed would lacerate your esophagus or perforate your intestine, but except for allergies, you’re remarkably healthy.

And now you’re five years old, and the quiet gentleman of the house, except when you do your post-dinner show, roo-ing and galloping up and down the hall.

I love that you wake up half an hour before you really need to go outside, just so you can come into the bed with me and snuggle while Fuzzy showers. I love your raspy-tongued kisses, and the way you can eviscerate a squeaky toy in five minutes, then carry the empty fleece carcass around for months.

I love that every night when I go to bed to read, you come and curl up with me. I love that you’re patient with your adopted brother Tedasaurus Rex, even though he had the nerve to grow taller than you, and that you make the foster brothers and sisters who rotate through your life feel like part of the pack.

I love the way you, my 80-pound darling, can manage to get lost in our postage stamp of a back yard, and I love that you still think an empty paper towel roll is the best toy ever.

I love the way you’ll chase a ball til it stops, then turn around and give me that look that means, “If you’d wanted it back you should have adopted a retriever,” and I love that even though you’re a gentle giant of a dog, you have a basso profundo bark that makes me feel safe when I’m alone.

I love that you’re as happy to sit on the deck and just WATCH the birds and squirrels as you are to chase them, and I love that the last thing I hear at night is your deep, restful, doggy breathing.

So, happy fifth birthday, my Max.

You can’t really be called a Monster Pup any more, but in my heart you’ll always be my puppy.

Peeling the Eggplant

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Lollypop Santa

We’ve all heard the story (possibly apocryphal, but it’s a good story so, who cares?) about the woman who was making a roast. Her daughter, watching her, asked, “Mom, why are you cutting the ends off the roast?”

The mother replied that she was doing so because it was the way she learned from her mother, but didn’t know why it made the roast better.
Together, they went to the other room to ask Grandma why the ends were cut off the roast, and the old woman replied that she’d HAD to do it that way, because it was the only way the roast would fit in the pan.

Similarly, those of us who grew up with grandmothers and mothers who peeled eggplant before using it, also peel eggplant. But the thing is, you don’t actually have to peel eggplant for most dishes. Sure, it feels rubbery when it’s raw, but it cooks down fairly well.

Holiday traditions are sort of the same way. Some of them, like the roast, or the eggplant, we do because we always have. I grew up with a butterfly at the top of the Christmas tree, and the first year I had my very own tree, I felt guilty for putting something OTHER than a butterfly up there. Then my husband and I found a lovely quarter-moon ornament and that was our topper in the first years of our marriage.

More recently, as our (fake, plastic, pre-lit) trees have become taller and taller, we’ve had to adjust the topper again. Currently, it’s an angel I bought at Cracker Barrel, but I picked her because she’s got this delicious smirk, as if she knows some great secret.

Sometimes, though, traditions have to be completely new. Since moving to Texas nine years ago (yes, that feels like forever to me, too) we’ve planned Christmas Eve to be our night. Sure, we might go to a Christmas Eve service (or two – because I love midnight mass, so even when we were at UUCOC, we’d still go), but otherwise, we keep the evening low-key.

Christmas Day, however, is all about inviting friends and “chosen family” over for brunch. Everyone gets at least one present to open, and we celebrate with laughter and good food.

I’m sure as we age, we’ll come up with some newer traditions even than those, but whether we spend Christmas with just ourselves, or with other people, whether we peel the eggplant, or not, the entire season will be full of fun and friends and fabulous food.

Today’s Santa: The very young child of a friend dubbed him Lollypop Santa, and the name stuck. He’s from Cracker Barrel. Seriously, sometimes they have great decor.

Holidailies 2013

Thursday 13: Falling for Fall

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Autumn Running from iStockPhoto.com

I haven’t been blogging lately – the need to do so ebbs and flows, and that’s okay – but I woke this morning to the sight of frost on the neighbor’s rooftop, so thought I’d share a list today in the grand old Thursday 13 tradition.

  1. Onomatopoetic Environments: Crunch! go the leaves beneath our feet. Creak! go the trees as they are pushed by the wind. Groan! go the pipes as hot water rushes through them. Hiss! says the heater when we cave in and turn it on.
  2. Sweater Weather: We’ve settled into the time of year when we can wear long sleeves or a light sweater during the day, and bundle into comfy cotton-flannel pajamas in the evening.
  3. De-bugging: Okay, we still have a few mosquitoes here in Texas, but there are fewer of them, and the stragglers are sluggish. If only the fleas would go away, as well.
  4. Cozy Mornings: Birdsong, soft light, whuffling dogs, fresh coffee, oatmeal with craisins, lingering over coffee…
  5. Guilt-free Baths: I might still take bubble baths in summer, but in fall I don’t feel like I have to justify the need to soak in steamy, sudsy, lavender-scented water. Also? I love the tingle on my skin, when I step out of my warm bath and into the chill air of the bathroom.
  6. Frost: Frost counts as a “weather event” here, and we’ve just had our first glimpse of it. I love the way the sun melts it away, oh, so slowly, as warm light replaces cold.
  7. Fall Produce: Yes, our modern society allows us to have squash and apples year round if we really want it, but food tastes best when it’s actually in season. Pumpkins, butternut squash, acorn squash, root vegetables, and apples – fall foods, all.
  8. Soups and Stews: Fall is soup weather. Rainy days, cool nights, and the need for easy lunches all mean that my crockpot gets a workout. A recent favorite? Chicken and sweet potato soup. So delicious.
  9. Quilts: I have no desire to step back in time and live on the prairie with the Ingalls family, but I do love the way a warm quilt doesn’t just serve a purpose, but is also a piece of art. I have books on quilting, and all the required materials, and yet, I never take the leap into making a quilt of my own. Must. Fix. This.
  10. Lamplight: This is a frequent theme with me, but I love the soft light of lamps, as opposed to harsh overhead lighting. I also love streetlamps, and fall is when you get to enjoy deep twilight and glowing streetlights in prime form.
  11. Figure Skating: I’m not a big follower of sports. I’ll watch the occasional baseball or hockey game. I like seeing soccer players in those tiny shorts. But the sports that I actually look forward to are horse racing (in spring) and figure skating. Skate France is on tv this Sunday. Guess what my plans are?
  12. Festivals: I’m a sucker for a good small-town festival, and fall is rife with them. Apple festivals. Pumpkin festivals. Craft fairs. Harvest fests. Even the state fair. Some are cheesy, it’s true, but it’s good to embrace hometown corn once in a while.
  13. Antici…pation: Even without the knowledge that Christmas is creeping ever closer (or we’re creeping closer to it, as the calendar is fixed), fall always fills me with anticipation. For holidays, for seeing family, for favorite foods. For the first local performances of Nutcracker. For the first time I see my breath when I take the dogs out in the morning. For the sense that all of the dying leaves and dwindling greenery isn’t an ending, but a Great Preparation for all the things yet to come in the next week, month, quarter, year.

For more of my thoughts on autumn, check out last week’s Sunday Brunch post, Sunday Brunch: The Light in Autumn over at All Things Girl.

Find a PetSitter, Help A Shelter Dog

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CuddlyMax

This is quick and dirty because it’s Halloween, and I’m hugely busy, but I wanted to share this before the campaign ends tonight.

The folks at DogVacay, a site that helps you find a pet sitter, are providing a meal to a shelter dog for every new sign-up they get during October. They asked me if I’d mention it, and even though I haven’t used their site…yet…I think they offer a great service, and I’m a sucker for anyone willing to help an animal.

Max, Teddy, and Perry think this is pretty cool, especially since they were all shelter dogs, once upon a time, and are also familiar with what it’s like when their humans go away, and they have to stay with a pet sitter (or, more likely, have a sitter stay with them.)

We used to kennel Cleo (RIP) and Zorro (RIP) but switched to sitters years ago because it’s less stressful for the animals, and one less thing we have to remember.

So, check out DogVacay, and sign up today, and feed a shelter dog.

(I was asked if I’d write something, but there was no compensation for doing so…Happy Halloween!)

We All Float Here

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Under the Tub It may be a first world problem, but for someone who styles herself The Bathtub Mermaid, it’s a personal tragedy: my bathtub is broken.

Early last week I was taking a bath, and I overfilled the tub. When I pulled the drain plug to let some water out, instead of just the plug coming up, the whole drain came out of the tub. Upon investigation, we learned that the elbow joint meant to connect the drain to the drainpipe was on the ground under the tub.

We called the home warranty company, and they sent a plumber who said we had to remove the ceramic tile step at the end of the tub. We tried, but there’s no way to do that without breaking into the actual floor. However, when we cut into the drywall half-wall at the back of the tub we saw that the pipe is NOT under the ceramic tile, but under the tub.

So now we’re waiting for the plumber to come back.

Meanwhile, there’s a gaping hole in the fake wall at the end of the tub (Fuzzy has put his dremel case in front of it, so a) I don’t have to see it and b) the dogs won’t explore it and c) no creepy-crawly things emerge from it) but I’ve clearly read too many Stephen King novels, because every time I see the expanse of exposed pipe, or catch a glimpse of the drain hole in my tub, in which the drain fixture currently is not, I keep thinking of Pennywise the Clown from It.

I’m really glad my neighborhood doesn’t have old-style gutters with metal grates, because, as it is, every time I enter my bathroom I hear a filtered version of Tim Curry’s voice growling, “We all float here.”

DCC Fan Days is Coming

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DCC Fan Days

Just a quick update to let people know that I’m covering Dallas Comic Con Fan Days (Website: http://www.scifiexpo.com/DCC/fandays.html) the 4-6 of October. I’ll be doing this in my role of editor-at-large for All Things Girl.

Last year, we attended as ‘just fans’, and I enjoyed it, but I didn’t spend as much time as I wanted to engaging with the actual comicbook (one word, per Stan Lee) artists, so this year my focus will be on that, and on the fan experience in general.

Fall in Love

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couple-with-heart-smiling_by_laskvv-via-istockphoto

An excerpt from a letter to a friend’s daughter:

Fourth, fall in love. Fall in love hard. And often. Enjoy it, because love – real love – is messy and exciting and kinda scary. But don’t get married. At least, don’t get married until you’re over 25, have seen Europe, have lived on your own for at least a year, and have experienced at least one TRULY TRAGIC love affair.

You can hear the whole letter, and a wee bit more in today’s entry for the Dog Days of Podcasting.

Link: DDoP #16 – Unsolicited Advice.