It's been too long since I updated. I can tell because now I want to write about
the boat parade and the guaranteed-seedless oranges, the half-marathon, the tree,
the local climate, getting back to work, and holiday presents. And probably other
stuff I've forgotten. And e-cards. And good cheese. I don't know how to write
about all that coherently without creating The Entry That Ate My Day, so I'm
afraid coherence will have to suffer.
The boat parade went fairly
well. We had an eight, decked out with white lights along both gunwales, white and
colored lights crusting bow and stern decking, glowsticks along the oars, and
battery lights -- red bulbs and multi-colored stars -- pinned along the rowers'
arms. Rudder was the main planners, and he does tend to excess, which of course is
the right thing to do anyhow in this sort of situation. Unfortunately, I can't
find any pictures of the parade at al online, much less of our boat. But I'm told
we looked good, and rumor has it we won the human-powered division. (Since we
launch on one side of the lake, and the awards were announced on the other side,
we weren't there for them.) It wasn't nearly as much fun as last year, probably
because instead of T2 and Egret we had a bunch of people whom we don't know well,
only a few of whom were willing to help with all the necessary planning and set-
up.
Somewhere during the several hours we were there doing up the
decorations, I ran off to the supermarket with another woman, whom I will call
Anjou. We actually had a blast, picking up things like pizelles and eggnog and
some wonderful sweet tiny oranges (Clementines, maybe?) whose peels practically
zipped off. I can now report that a French accent can be an enormous asset in
brief interactions. Anjou got the produce guy to solemnly swear to her that the
clementines were seedless, and he was charmed; if I had tried that I would have
just sounded whiny. Even I kept having the urge to explain that yes, you can
expect American supermarkets to sell Christmas lights, unlike smaller European
markets. Fortunately I managed to suppress that urge; since she's been in this
state six years, as long as I have, it's probably safe to assume she knows what
supermarkets are like.
Yesterday, I did a half-marathon on the erg.
That's 21097 meters. I was a bit disappointed to finish a few minutes slower than
last year. I wasn't pulling hard, but I wasn't then, either. I now have only about
35000 left for the holiday challenge. (If T2 or Egret are reading this, no, I am
not going to knock it all off in one marathon row. Yes, I am a wimp.) After that
we went out and got the Christmas tree, me walking like an old woman. We've got
it set up, but only had time to put on one string of lights -- because of the boat
decorating, we have tons of them, so it will be a very well-lit tree. Next week
we're driving up north about three hours just to get yet another tree, a live one
that we'll then plant on our lot up north. It's a bit redundant, but this is the
time of year for that. Having come late to Christmas, I'm not annoyed with its
excesses, and have no desire yet to scale back. Besides, just this year we've
gotten about six more ornaments (from Korea, Alaska, the National Cathedral, and
Mount Vernon) and we may be outgrowing one tree. I don't think we'll normally be
having more than one tree, though; it's just that the live one will probably only
be three feet tall and that's just not big enough to make the whole house feel
festive. The first year we had a tree, we bought lots of plain gold and red balls,
(as well as some crystal and silver icicles and a few things we just liked) so the
plain ornaments are gradually being replaced by those that mean something to us. I
still hang at least some of the stars made from tuna-can-lids that I got before I
even met Rudder, when I had a tiny tree one year because Gymrat, a lapsed
Catholic, was visiting over the holiday. (I need to call him, come to think of
it.)
This also appears to be the time of year for cheese; at least
three times in the last few weeks, people have brought in cheeses and crackers
(Anjou's Beaujolais Nouveau party, Thursday afternoon in last week's class, and
now today at work) which have included all kinds of wonderful cheeses. Yum. Wines
and cheeses .... nothing like foods that are both tasty and able to make you feel
all sophisticated. I don't know if the cheese markets out here have suddenly
gotten good or what, but I believe I'll be hitting Trader Joe's or AJ's, our local
gourmet shops (supermarkets with delusions of grandeur) for some holiday
noshes.
The climate thing: I don't think our climate works the way
other places do -- our temperatures seem to depend only on how much sun we get.
There are hardly any clouds to seal heat in or out, so our coldest part of the
year isn't really the part called winter. Instead we always seem to get our
coldest days around now, late December into early January, when the days are
shortest.
The presents and e-cards things: Uh, need to mail the one
and compose and send the others.
I think that's
it.
Oops, one more thing:
Today I am thankful for: cool
coworkers