Semester's Close

I love this time of year. Last night, when I realized that the weekend was over and I had to go back to work the next day, I didn't even mind. It's quiet at the office because all of the students are either buckled down finishing the last of their finals, or quietly packing up and slipping away home. I share that feeling of relief (finally done!) now that I'm a student again, too--my final paper is all but submitted (ABS), and I had my last class this evening, just watching some PowerPoints. One of the groups that presented last week gave out free toothbrushes to everyone in the class: early Christmas present! I actually do see it that way: I like toothbrushes, and dental hygiene in general. I floss every day, brush morning and night, and sometimes after lunch. And take a multivitamin every morning. These are like religious rituals, the things I do each day to ensure good health and long life and tooth retention.

We finally got our Christmas tree this weekend. Nay, our two trees. We got a real one from the garden center down the road, and a bright silver one from--of all places--Urban Outfitters. I've looked everywhere for just the tree I want, silver or white and kind of sparse, but there was nothing at Target, nothing at the hardware store, I even tried KMart and Macy's and Michael's and some other far-flung places. And then we wandered into UO yesterday and practically tripped over just what I was looking for. I'll try to get some pictures soon.

The real tree is looking a little bare right now as it awaits its gingerbread adornment. I always do gingerbread ornaments. My parents got an artificial tree when I was little, but when I was in high school they started augmenting the big fake tree with a little real one in the kitchen, because my mom missed the nice smell. Since all of our ornaments went on Big Fake, we needed something else to put on Little Real, and I volunteered to make cookie ornaments. I usually just pick one or two shapes for all the cookies. The first year I did Hippos and Hearts. Another time we did all gingerbread men. Last year, when Stephen and I had our own tree for the first time, we made moose-shaped cookies. I think I might go back to hearts this year, for simplicity's sake. Plus, I've been doodling a lot of hearts lately. I don't know what that means, but I have to be careful about it, because you can't just sit in a meeting or class and doodle hearts all over your notebook. People would talk.

Christmas Prep

Whoops. I didn't make pickles after all. Waited too long and the dill went bad. This is what they would have looked like, though. (The picture is from August, but the red and green is festive, no?)

Instead, I made oranges full of cloves. Not for eating, for looking at and smelling--and how! Those things smell fantastic. An orange-and-clove scented breakfast table is just the thing with one's morning bowl of Rice Krispies.

That's pretty much the only decorating we've done for Christmas so far--no tree yet. I really ought to get going on that, because I want two this year, a real one and a fake one. Here's my reasoning: The real one will smell good and look nice. But I like to keep the tree up through January, and that doesn't work so well with a real tree, because it dries out after a couple of weeks and starts shedding needles and posing a fire hazard. And if you miss the two-day window during which Public Works will truck it away, you must dispose of the thing in a sneaky fashion, as we did last year by cutting it up and hiding it in garbage bags. Lots of drama and intrigue.

So the plan this year is to enjoy the real one until the pick-up deadline, then bask in the glow of the fake one for the rest of the Christmas season (which, as far as I'm concerned, ends a month after the holiday--else how could I get through the long, dark chill of January?)

But not just any fake tree will do. Just as I dislike vegetarian food that pretends to be meat (faux grill-marked Boca Burgers, I'm looking at you), I don't like fake trees that try to look real. If I'm going fake, I'm going fake all the way. Right now, I'm thinking something silver or white. I haven't found just the right one yet, but I know it's out there. The hunt is on!

Cupcake Overload

It was Stephen's birthday last week, so we have a lot of leftover cupcakes sitting around the house now. Why doesn't Betty Crocker make half-batches of cake mix? You can't help but make two dozen. I've been eating them for breakfast and for dessert, but we've still got about 10 left in the fridge. It's funny how breakfast and dessert foods are so similar--not bacon and eggs, I know, but danishes and donuts would feel just as right after dinner as they do first thing in the morning. Moreso, even. Or they should, but people would probably think it wrong to serve muffins for dessert. But what is the Muffin, after all, if not Cupcake's unadorned cousin with pretensions of nutritiousness?

Sometimes I try to imagine what visitors who have never experienced American/Western cuisine find strange about our food. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches probably seem kind of gross. (Peanuts processed into a fatty spread? Combined with gelatinous berry goo? Sandwiched between slices of bread? Yum.) And cereal with milk. ("It's like a soup, served cold. With two ingredients--milk and bits of dry cooked grains.") And hot dogs. Even we don't like to think too much about hot dogs.

Anyway, so now Stephen's a year older, and we've got all these cupcakes in the fridge. Our Fair City received a blast of frigid arctic air this weekend, but the radiators are keeping drafts at bay, and the garden center down the street is selling Christmas trees. Midnight Madness is this Thursday. Oh, and I bought pickling supplies! So I'm planning to make some homemade pickles today. Those will go nicely with the cupcakes, I'm sure.

What's This?

Snow! It's snowing and snowing outside. I have to drive across the state tonight, and I don't even care. It looks so awesome out there. People complain about Holiday Creep, but I have no problem with it. None. At. All. I woke up the other day so excited about the Christmas Season. Family - yes! Tree decorating - yes! Cookies, presents, snow, snow boots, wool hats, wrapping, jollyness - yes, yes, yes. Bring it on.

Sweet Jane

Oh, wait. Blankets. I was going to write more about blankets.

This started around the time I went off to college. I had a work study job (hence, disposable income, although a paltry amount--$5.40 an hour doesn't add up quickly), and a bed to clothe, and no closet full of blankets and sheets with which to clothe it. I quickly discovered that I loved buying bed stuff--sheet sets, pillow cases, quilts, comforters, you name it. I started with two sets of ticking-striped cotton sheets, then added a flannel set for the winter. I found a sewing pattern for pillowcases and starting making my own. I spent a whole year quilting a homemade cover for my comforter. Cutting out all the pieces and sewing it together was a long and tedious process, but I loved my dorm bed that year. Coziest thing ever.

When I moved into my first apartment, I inherited my grandparents' old maple bed frame. Since it was a double bed, I had ("had") to find all new linens. I bought a new comforter and some fancy sheets (I remember discussing thread counts with my roommates). And kept going from there.

These days, I've got a spring quilt, a summer quilt, a fall/winter quilt, a yellow quilt for the couch, a wool blanket for the green reading chair, two duvet covers, a mountain of pillowcases, and almost half a dozen sheet sets. It's ridiculous, I know. But a warm bed is synonymous with home and comfort for me. I like nesting.

Unfortunately, our apartment is far too well-heated for such things. The radiators are irrepressible. I grew up in a house heated by wood stoves--a romantic, but relatively ineffective, method of heating, especially when your room is in the attic (as mine was) and the wood stove is on the ground floor (as ours was). So blankets were essential to winter comfort.

Luckily, with the New England chill right outside, we're still able to recreate the wood-heat experience occasionally by opening the windows at night to let the cool air spill in. Wasteful, I know, but we can't control the thermostat--it's set for the whole building. And it means I can pile the bed high with blankets, just as it should be.
________

In other news, for all you Jane Austen lovers out there (my sister and I actually call her J.A.): Did you know that PBS is playing adaptations of all her novels in January? At least, they are here in Boston. I saw an ad for the series today, accompanied by the Cowboy Junkies cover of Sweet Jane. Ha! A network after my own heart.

Low Tech

From "Caution: Killing Germs May be Hazardous to Your Health," in the October 29th issue of Newsweek (what can I say, sometimes I get a little behind on the news):

Americans have been obsessed with eradicating germs ever since their role in disease was discovered in the 19th century, but they've been partial to technological fixes like antibiotics or sanitizers rather than the dirty work of cleanliness.

(And by the "dirty work of cleanliness," the authors apparently mean washing "in all the spaces between the fingers and under the nails and rubbing for at least 20 seconds.")

I agree. Although I cringe a little when I hear broad generalizations about "Americans," as though we're all of one mind, I do think that many people put a lot more faith in technology than in time-tested, low-tech remedies for things like disease and climate change. Maybe there's a feeling that simple, old-fashioned solutions--soap rather than sanitizers, clotheslines as opposed to Energy Star dryers--just can't solve our weighty problems. Or that technology will save us. Or that taking the bus is just less glamorous/fun/enlightened- looking than driving a shiny new hybrid.

I don't say this to be Greener-Than-Thou. I have a car (not a hybrid); I have a computer; I just got a flu shot. I'm a fan of technology. But I find it reassuring that research is now showing that the simplest and cheapest ways of doing things--cleaning with baking soda and vinegar, buying less, walking more, drinking plain ol' water right out of the tap--are good for our health and good for the planet.

Dreamy

Two dream-like things have happened to me in the last twenty-four hours:

I awoke in the dark at 4:59 this morning to the sound of a small crash, about the volume of a slammed car door, followed by the frantic peals of a car alarm. There were flashing lights, and I could hear a large truck huffing and puffing outside--like a garbage truck, but they don't come by on Sundays. I walked to the window and saw that a firetruck passing its way up our narrow, potholed road with lights blaring but with no siren, had swiped the bumper of a little Honda hatchback out front. The car, as though startled from its slumber, was squealing and screeching its dismay. Three tired firefighters stood, surveying it, in the hazy glow of the streetlights. After a minute, the Honda settled itself, one of the firemen took its plate number, and the truck moved silently on.

That's the kind of scene my sleeping mind is wont to fabricate, and I'd be convinced now that I'd been dreaming then if Stephen didn't remember it, too.

In the daylight, hours later, we took the train to North Station in search of a new cupcakery we'd heard about in Boston. The storefront was so narrow that we almost missed it. Inside, a table for two was crowded in one corner, and a narrow counter ran along the opposite wall. An antique mint green lacquered stove stood sentinel next to a waist-high cooler of fancy drinks in translucent pastel-colored bottles. The remainder of the shop was divided in two by an enormous glass case filled with the kind of fanciful desserts that one might see in Willy Wonka and wish were true. S'mores cupcakes topped with tiny toasted marshmallows. Palm-sized Boston cream pies. Homemade Hostess cupcakes. Miniature pumpkin cheesecakes. Vanilla cupcakes, chocolate cupcakes, peanut butter and jelly cupcakes. Oreo cupcakes. Red velvet cupcakes. And so on. And on and on and on.

We bought four, and stuffed two in our mouths immediately. I drifted off to my afternoon meeting on an extended sugar high. The remaining two now sit, fluffy and decadent, preening, in their little white bakery box on the kitchen counter.

Proof that dreams can come true. Wow.