But here’s what I noticed, while walking across my office floor, after I had been at work for about an hour and fifteen minutes:

SOMETHING WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?

In my defense, they are technically the same shoe with a different “style” so the soles and heels are identical and they FEEL identical?

…But that’s a pretty weak defense.

Fortunately, I had actually packed a different pair of shoes to wear for New Year’s, so I put those on:

WIN.

The only trouble here, as I sit at my desk ruminating about the end of the day, is trying to decide whether to wear the mismatched but comfortable shoes to commute, or the matching but not really conducive to carrying heavy luggage full of booze.

MY LIFE IT IS A COMEDY OF ERRORS.

<3

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Somehow, this prompted the statement, I don’t know if it was mine or my mother’s, that only Bad Santas shop at the Dollar Tree.

This has only escalated over the last few weeks into threats that Bad Santa is coming to visit, followed by plaintive cries of “NO BAD SANTA!!” Or alternatively “ONLY GOOD SANTA.”

As Bad Santa shaped into a figure of myth and legend at the Fougner Family Barn, he developed an origin story which involved him being Good Santa’s younger brother who was always overshadowed by his more successful older brother, Good Santa, and I think he was raised by his evil aunt and uncle in a cupboard under the stairs, because that’s not anyone else’s history. Anyway, Bad Santa’s job is to bring horrible presents to all the naughty boys and girls.

GUESS WHO CAME TO OUR HOUSE THIS YEAR? WE MUST HAVE BEEN VERY BAD.

Bad Santa comes on Christmas Eve before everyone goes to bed. He brings a dead tree and decorates it with old rags to make it look like snow. He brings gifts like gopher traps, fly paper, and paper towels:

I know lots of people are posting their exciting hauls of Christmas gifts, but I CHALLENGE ANY OF YOU TO TOP THIS:

1) Off-brand disposable dental floss pics.
2) A night light without a light bulb.
3) A pack of four fly catchers.
4) A 16 oz bottle of Ajax soap
5) Two disposable aluminum foil cake pans.

YEAH. BEAT THAT BAD SANTA LIST.

When we woke this morning, there was another Christmas Miracle! In the night, the Magical Bad Santa Hat had appeared atop Bad Santa’s tree!

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Now, there are two things to consider about the arrival of this box.

1) I have never been sent flowers at work. I have been sent flowers on a couple occasions, but not in over ten years, and never, ever at work.
2) I was out on Friday, playing tourguide. So this box had been sitting here for at least three nights. I was very worried that it would be ruined when I opened it, that whatever was in it had wilted over the weekend.

When I opened it, this was inside:

with a note implicating whirled in its delivery.

It also came with lights, but I thought that might be a little much for the workplace. Maybe I should put them around my computer monitor :-P

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The other day, I got this huge box. It was large and I was not expecting a box. Now, given the nature of my work, sometimes, getting boxes means that I’m getting a particularly zany submission. So my first reaction was “UH OH.”

But then I looked at it and it was addressed to me directly and not to “submissions editor.” And the “from” label was something about beverages. Beverages! Had I ordered something from Cocktail Kingdom and forgotten about it?

Then I noticed that it was posted from Chicago. And I remembered that karnythia had said something about sending me some mead.

WIN. This stuff is coming to Connecticut with me this weekend. One of them is a bottle of Chocolate mead and one is a bottle of hibiscus.

So then just a little while ago, I get ANOTHER PACKAGE. ANOTHER, IN THE SAME WEEK, YOU ASK.

GOD YES.

I was still not expecting a package but this one was a little easier to put together because the “from” address on the package was “ALEPH AND BETH.”

I opened the box.

GIANT CORNUCOPIA OF SWEDISH CANDIES.

In short, YOU PEOPLE ARE AWESOME AND NOW I HAVE MEAD AND CHOCOLATE.

Seriously, I have the best friends ever from the internet. <3

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But the

And since we

Let it

Let it

Let it

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–I have finally, for the first time in my adult life, cultivated a real, personal sense of style. I’ve learned how to wear clothes that look good on me and fit me, and how to accessorize. This might seem a bit silly but it has been great for my confidence and the way I comport myself

–I have also completely stopped using disposable dishes. I used to be really bad about using plastic and paper dishes and utensils because I was really lazy about doing my dishes. I’m still lazy about doing my dishes but I have pretty much eliminated disposable eating ware from my home use, unless I’ve ordered takeout and it comes in a disposable dish.

–I have also gained confidence in terms of socializing and making friends. A huge part of this has been thanks to rosefox who is wonderful, and all the wonderful people she’s introduced me to, including supertailz, who is also wonderful. I really only see them once or twice a week but just that has made me open up to other social activities. I went from being home pretty much all the time, to having difficulty finding a free evening. I am meeting new friends and re-engaging with old ones. And being brave enough to ask people to do things! This coming week, I don’t have any social plans (yet), and it feels a little weird– and a bit welcome, since I somehow live in a whirlwind of events and engagements now. That being said, if anyone’s free Tues or Wed next week, let me know and I’d love to do something!

So that is the past year. A couple of days before my birthday, I resolved to try something I had never succeeded at before.

You see, I keep a very messy purse. One of those bottomless purses full of crap that should never have gone into the purse in the first place, everything in disarray. I always have to stop and rifle through it to find my Metrocard or my work ID or a credit card, and feel terrible for the number of times I’ve held up lines or bothered the fellows at the front desk at my office to let me in without my ID.

So, a month ago, just before my birthday, I bought this:

It’s a large wallet that holds all my credit cards, my cash, my word ID, my Metrocard, and my passport (which is my government ID of choice, since I don’t drive)

I’ve tried this before, a few times. Once or twice with small “insert” purses that go inside a larger purse, which is what my mom uses. Or with smaller wallets. I don’t know what made me decide that maybe THIS kind of wallet would work where the others didn’t.

Maybe it’s the type of wallet. Maybe it’s just that it was time, and for the first time in my life, I was ready to take the tiniest of leaps into personal organization (definitely not my strong suit. In fact, I don’t think it’s my weak suit, either. Let’s just say where I’m concerned, it’s not a suit at all).

But this time, it’s working. I have been carrying it for a month today, and so far, I have only misplaced my Metrocard once. I misplaced one credit card once. With those tiny exceptions, it has been a smooth, hold-up-free month where I no longer have to feel ashamed or embarrassed about my inability to dash for the subway or pay for my groceries.

And it is glorious.

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The house in Connecticut is still out of power, and ETA puts power coming back on in 7+ days. Most of the traffic lights in our neck of the woods are still out, and while they’ve cleared some of the roads, others are still blocked– mostly by downed trees, moreso than flooding.

My grandparents had to be evacuated in Delaware due to tornado threats in their town. Several homes in my aunt’s apartment complex were destroyed, although hers is intact, thank goodness, and she spent the night in a high school that was serving as a shelter. My grandparents went to my cousins’ house. One of my other cousins lives in a trailer park where she said that her trailer and three next to hers were all right, but everything after that was destroyed by a tornado. I am just so relieved that everyone in my family made it through safely.

At around 2 am Saturday-into-Sunday, I shut down my computer, ready to go to bed, and the power blinked out. I laughed, certain that my timing had just been impeccable– but two minutes later, the power came back on.

So I started turning off lights, when I heard the most tremendous noise coming from outside. The wind was loud, but it wasn’t the wind. It was the chickens. Crying. Now the chickens were as safe as they could be, in a storm pen inside the stable, with things to climb on if the stable flooded (unlikely, since it’s at the highest point on the property). But they were crying so loudly and so mournfully, it was like nothing I’d ever heard. Screaming chickens. For a second, I considered going outside to see if they were all right– I feared the worst, a problem with the stable or a wild animal that found its way in. But common sense told me that going outside in the height of a hurricane to check on chickens was not the wisest choice I could make, so I went to bed (in the basement, as my bedroom is just beneath two massive old sugar maples).

I woke up at 12:24 pm to discover no power and the storm more or less dissipated– it was still rainy and windy, but there were patches of sun, and it was perfectly reasonable to go outside. We made some scrambled eggs on the grill, ate some blueberry pie that my mother had made the day before, and made a lot of headway on de-cluttering the room that is eventually going to be our bar, let the chickens out, and hunted down the cat, who was hiding in a ball in the loft in my bedroom (my bedroom used to be a hayloft). It was probably the point closest in the whole house to the wind, so possibly not the most intuitive choice for hiding, but whatever she wants to do, you know.

The chickens, by the way, were totally fine, if their feathers were a bit ruffled (literally).

We went to the neighbors’ house, and helped get things ready for their daughter’s wedding next weekend, and had some quick dinnery things along with copious amounts of delicious homemade wine, and used their generator to re-charge our phones and check the mass transit situation. The train line I usually take home had downed trees on it, so it was pretty apparent I was not going to get to work today, even if the roads got cleared (most of the roads out of our neighborhood were blocked by trees). We munched on some quickly-melting gelato, and went home. I called Brendan, who had already come to this conclusion on his own, and told me that out neighborhood here was totally fine– we live about three blocks apart from each other on top of a hill, so it seemed pretty good.

When we got home, though, we discovered that the chickens’ coop had been blown shut by the wind, while they were all outside doing chickeny chicken things (all but one), and they were all huddling in a pile on top of the coop all shivering and cold and awwwww poor chickens. My mama picked them up one by one and put them in their nice warm coop, and they cuddled against her for warmth.

By then, it was getting too dark to see, so out came the battery-operated lanterns.

I read for about two hours until my lanterns all started to fade, and then went to bed at around eleven, and woke up at nine this morning– to a distinct lack of any power.

So my mother and I cleaned out the fridge– but left the freezers shut tight, in the hopes that maybe the power would come back on before the food defrosted completely. And then we made up this delicious lunch:

That is some delicious gnocchi with brown butter and crispy fried sages, and some yummy wienerschnizel. I am quite pleased with the fact that this is what we managed to cook on our outdoor grill (since the stove in the house is electric).

We did some other cleanup chores, then chased the chickens around to get them back in their coop– they hate going in in the middle of a beautiful day! And left to get home.

Well, getting home was a pain in the butt, since there were still a lot of roads on our usual route that were blocked by down trees, and still a lot of traffic lights out in the area. A trip that usually takes an hour took three hours, but after three hours, I was home safe in my apartment that still has power, nothing damaged, and I was able to turn on my air conditioning, and, realizing that I was probably about the filthiest I would be for a month, scrubbed the heck out of my bathtub, which was looking for a cleaning, before taking a Daenerys-Targaryen-hot shower, and scrubbed and descaled and shaved and did a nice face mask and all sorts of lovely things. And then I put on a dress! A dress, after breaking my I Don’t Wear Pants rule twice over the weekend (this is a rule I have, in which I only wear pants when I absolutely must, for things like beekeeping), and it was lovely and wonderful and I felt very grateful that all was well.

My parents are still out of power, and we found out only after we left that it may be a week till the house gets power back, and I don’t know if there’s an ETA for the apartment (also out!). I feel really badly for them; I’m not sure if they can get water without a pump since they’re on the second floor. I told my mother she could come back over here, but she declined.

So I went out to Whiskey Monday, saw some new friends, met some new-new friends, had some lovely drinks, and now I am home and so sleepy in a luscious, languorous way that is the result of hard work that makes it very satisfying.

I hope that all of you are safe and cozy and the things and people you love are intact! And that your chickens did not cry too hard.

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So I got up this morning, my mother and I picked all the vegetables that were ripe to pick and at risk of being destroyed, and we have this incredible bounty of stuff to pickle and make jam from– there’s going to be a LOT of grape jam, yessiree bob, since there aren’t enough grapes to make wine and we really had to get them off the vines.

We weighted down the beehives so that they would be secure in the wind (we hope!) and moved the chickens into a storm pen in the stable, although as soon as we did it (in torrentially pouring rain this morning), the rain died down and now the chickens are angry they’re indoors. OH WELL, CHICKENS. IT IS FOR YOUR OWN GOOD.

liret, I should mention, helped build the storm pen, so I took some pictures so she can see it in action:

My grandparents down in Delaware have been evacuated because there is a tornado watch in their town. My cousin brought them up to her house which is outside the evacuation zone…of all the things in the house to save, my grandfather insisted on bringing his beer with him. Now you know where I get it from. My aunt is in a shelter at the local school.

I am mostly just worried about the garden and the animals at this point. Planning for possible loss of electricity and copious abuse of my liquor cabinet. We have tons of food and tons of water. I brought a whole bunch of books, too. The news out of NYC sounds like everything is shut down and I sort of wish I were there to see all the fancy department stores with their windows boarded up. It also sounds like the mass transit may not be back up on Monday, so I don’t feel bad about the fact that I was sort of expecting I might not be able to get into work.

Love to everyone! I have my phone and my mother’s iPad well-charged so if the electric goes down and we need to get a message out, we’ll figure it out.

I leave you with my pre-hurricane breakfast:

ETA: If you are in New York and can volunteer, here are some ways to help via an email from Assemblyman Paul Newell:

2) The Mayor’s Office is looking for volunteers to staff the evacuation/hurricane centers at Seward Park HS (Grand St. & Ludlow St) and Baruch College (E. 24th St. & Lexington). They are asking for any willing volunteers that live in these areas to please help out if they can. Any hours today would be greatly appreciated. Overnight staffers are particularly important. Anyone interested in helping during this difficult time, please contact Leland M. Dyer at 347-844-3309 or via email at LDYER@CITYHALL.NYC.GOV.

3) The city needs volunteers (preferably in four hour shifts) from now through Monday. They would be especially grateful to those willing to volunteer for the Sunday shifts. The 311 facility is located on Maiden Lane and Williams street in Lower Manhattan and the 311 staff will provide training. If you can volunteer, please email Christie Huus at chuus@cityhall.nyc.gov. You can also fill out the city’s volunteer form at http://bit.ly/nycvolunteer.

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I don’t have as many pictures from Friday, because there was more eating and less photographing! Here are some things!

We started off at Kerbey Lane for breakfast, where I had peach-pecan pancakes. These were thick, light, fluffy, delicious pancakes! Nom!

Then, Katie took me to Barton Springs! She had explained Barton Springs to me on AIM before I got there, and told me to bring a bathing suit (which was a feat for me, and the only one I had was letting quite a bit of boobage spill out, but hey. Whatever she explained, I was not prepared for this place, which was kind of awesome and amazing.

It is half pool! It is half lake! It is a spring-fed swimming pool with seaweed on the bottom! CRAZY STUFF. It was also super cold and I kept getting seaweed in my hair which made me feel like a mermaid. Anyway, I also discovered that my upper body strength is not what it was. Man, I am a wussy. I couldn’t really tread water for very long, so I kind of hung around at the edge for a lot of the time, but it was still awesome A+ would swim again.

Then we went out for ice cream, but I totally forgot to take pictures of that. Boo. I thought I had taken a picture! Apparently not. And we went back to Katie’s and chilled with Rufus and Mishka and watched a bunch of Animaniacs, which was awesome, because I haven’t seen it since it was on the television box!

I ate the other candy that I bought at Big Top:

It’s called a Maple Bun! It was all maple flavored and peanutty, and much more delicious than the Idaho Spud. Win!

Then we got all dressed up and went downtown. There is a building which Katie told me the name of, but which I promptly forgot because she told me someone told her it looked like Totoro.

Then we went to a lovely restaurant called Peche, which was an absolutely divine bar. They had a really nice cocktail selection, plus absinthe fountains and a selection of close to twenty absinthes (17, I believe) to choose from. Katie got absinthe the traditional way; I got an absinthe cocktail. After a very nice whiskey drink. And the lovely bartender gave me two drinks for my birthday! We got dinner too– I got an absolutely scrumptious salad with sweetbreads and boudin and a beautiful runny egg on top. SO GOOD. Katie’s friend Clare met up with us, too, and she was awesome!

We went home and to bed pretty early– it was a long day and Saturday was going to be another one!

Also: rosefox made her first contribution to nommable today! Read it and look at the lovely pictures here.

I also posted a new post on how to make simple syrups out of candy! Read it here!

Delicious!

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katieupsidedown

rainy_day

erato

katieupsidedown picked me up at the airport, and we went back to her apartment where I met her adorable and very paranoid dog, Rufus, and the cat she is fostering, Mishka, who is black and was hiding under the bed, so I didn’t so much meet her as sort of see her eyes reflecting back in the darkness.

Then we got on the bus, which is apparently an unheard of rarity in Austin, and took it down to First Thursday on South Congress, which is like a sort of street fair/craft show outdoors ones a month. We went out to a local restaurant called South Congress Cafe, and got pretty nice salads and beers, and erato caught up with us, and then walked around looking at the stores and craft stalls and a trailer for the animal rescue that Mishka is from.

After the candy store, we headed to a bus stop, where we waited for a very long time before discovering we were waiting for the wrong bus.

While we were doing this, I opened one of the candies I bought, which was called an Idaho Spud:

So, once we realized we were in the wrong place, we called a cab, and erato left us, and we went out to a local bar called the Gibson, which had a pretty nice whiskey selection as well as a pretty nice beer selection, so I had a Manhattan and then some beers, and katieupsidedown and I chatted until closing time, and then went back to her place and chatted some more.

It is always really awesome to meet people I’ve known online for so long and discover that they are just as awesome in person as they are on the internet.

More soon! With more pictures.

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