Month: December 2005

Ya, in Bavaria, where the trees are made of wood!

Yesterday was Frankenmuth Day. elsaf drove judiang and me to Frankenmuth, MI. It was the first time there for all of us. Frankenmuth (the “u” is long in the name) is a town that considers itself Bavaria in Michigan. And it was a cute little town (well, little as in a hell of a lot bigger than my little town, but smaller than Judi & Elsa’s towns).

We started at Bronner’s, the world’s largest Christmas store. Indeed, it was. There were some neat things there – including some cool (expensive) nutcrackers that almost made me go back to my old Collecting Nutcrackers habit. I picked up a few things for my Christmas tree and some incense candles for my smoking men dolls.

After Bronner’s, we drove over to the River Place. This was a series of shops, many of which were cute & somewhat unique. I managed to get through without buying anything – yay! And then we found a parking place in the downtown area, so we could walk to the shops there.

We started at the Cheese Haus. I almost bought mom & dad some Cheap White Wine and Cheap Red Wine. These had generic labeling & were really cute. But they weren’t actually cheap, so I didn’t get any. 🙂 I did finally buy something at a Scottish fudge shop. (Buying fudge in a Scottish shop in a Bavarian town in Michigan – go figure!) I got some peanut butter fudge & some German chocolate fudge. The lady working there let me taste vanilla fudge, but I didn’t care much for it. (Not vanilla-y enough.)

Our final stop in Frankenmuth was the Bavarian Inn. There was a considerable wait for the seats, but the food was worth the wait. We’d ordered appetizers, but it turns out we didn’t actually need to. They had pickled beets, cranberry relish, chicken pasta salad, cole slaw, and noodle soup as starters as part of our meal. Then our ordered appetizers arrived – potato & cheese dumplings and ham & cabbage dumplings. We’d all ordered the Bavarian Combo, which had smoked pork chops, saur bratten, and wiener schnitzel. “Potatoes & kraut” were also provided and we then discovered the potatoes were the same potato dumplings we’d ordered as appetizers. Heh. (They were awfully good, so I didn’t complain.) The meal also came with noodles & corn – but we didn’t know this, so we all ordered spatzel (German pasta). So we had a LOT of food on our table. And we ate quite a bit.

Before supper, however, we made a pact to save room for dessert. So for the second night in a row, we had leftovers. And then we ordered dessert. I wanted to have the Holiday Peppermint Roll. Chocolate peppermint cake wrapped around peppermint ice cream and topped with handwhipped cream and crushed peppermint. Yummy! And all that peppermint probably helped with my digestion. Heh.

Today is Shopping Day (somebody forgot to get me a birthday present… I won’t name any names, but I’ll point at Judi) followed by an evening of fun at Elsa’s folks’ place. I hope that you all have a Happy New Year! (Some of you are already into 2006 – hope it’s going well for you!)

Road Tripping

My nearly 12-year-old car has been doing a great job. It got me to Detroit, got elsaf and I to Chicago, and yesterday, got Elsa, judiang and I back to Detroit. Elsa & I split the driving – I do the boring long stretches (hey, I’m a rural girl, I’m used to long, boring drives) and Elsa did the city driving in Chicago & Detroit. Works for me! 🙂

Yesterday, we had the last of the cheesecake for breakfast (that’s a wonderful breakfast, BTW) and then successfully packed up the car. We got on the road at exactly noon EST. Elsa successfully got us through the backed up city traffic and I took over when we got to Michigan. Lunch was at Culvers (Elsa & Judi’s first time there). Their pork tenderloin sammich is pretty good. And I love their vanilla ice cream.

We arrived at Elsa’s place not long after 6pm. We unloaded the car, then got into Elsa’s car for the drive to her brother’s house. Tom and his g/f Ardath were dog-sitting for Elsa. Judi and I got a real surprise when we got there. Ardi had given us some really cool Christmas presents! Yay! Neat holiday decorations and (for me) a cat cartoon day calendar.

Since we hadn’t had supper yet, we girls (Ardi joined us) went to La Shish for kabobs et al. They had bread & a garlic dip that was wonderful. I ordered garlic & almond rice with lamb. Very tasty, but I had filled up on bread, so I had a lot of leftovers. Yay, lunch today! And once again, Ardi gave us a surprise gift – she bought our supper! (I’m becoming quite the freeloader – the only meal I’ve bought on this trip was the lunch at Culvers!)

After lunch today, the goal is to head off to Frankemuth, MI. We’re going to shop in the German village (and Christmas store) and have a nice German meal. To make up for my freeloading, I’ve promised to buy supper. Mmmmm, saurkraut!

PS – new icon! ‘Tis one of my poems.

Operatic Meal

elsaf, judiang and I are stuffed to the gills tonight thanks to Opera, a very upscale (read expensive) Chinese restaurant just a few blocks down the road from Judi’s apartment. Elsa had a $50 off coupon, which is telling in itself. But we made good use of that coupon, I’ll tell you!

We started with drinks. Elsa, as our Designated Walker, stuck with diet Coke. But Judi and I got our usuals: Amaretto Sour. The sour was perfect. Which means that Judi had to dilute hers a bit. Heh. We got two appetizers: pork & ginger dumplings and beef & asparagus crepes. (I misheard the waiter and was trying to figure out how in the hell they stuffed all that stuff into grapes.) The appetizers were excellent – even the garnish was good.

For the main course, we tried Tiger prawn noodles with a curry sauce, scallops, and pineapple chicken & cashews. All three were excellent – they even served up the scallops in 3 separate dishes to make splitting the dishes easier. (We love to share – get to try more things that way.)

Despite being full, we ended up all ordering dessert. The waiter plonked down the dessert menus – we had no defense! Elsa got a Trio of Brulees. Since I’m VERY trad regarding creme brulee, I couldn’t order that dish. Judi got a Trio of Sorbets that the Iron Chefs would be proud of. (One was red wine & red pepper!) I stuck with the Trio of Chocolate items. Good lord! I now know what free-basing chocolate must be like! They had a flourless chocolate cake that was HEAVENLY. They also had a chocolate mousse cake that was decadent (but no match on the flourless cake). And an ice cream with chocolate somethings in it that was really just there so you didn’t OD on the chocolate. *sigh* I shall be remembering Opera with much fondness for years to come, I believe.

Now we’re back at Judi’s for our last night before returning to Detroit. We’ve been working on Judi’s new PC all day – and it’s been a real lesson in computer work. Elsa noticed a nice correlation between our computer building and another old tradition. You can read about that here. Perhaps I’ll go into more computer detail later. But for now, I must go blow up Judi’s old HD to reinstall Winders XP. Wish me luck! 🙂

White Christmas

We actually did have a White Christmas this year. But not quite what they had in mind with the famous Christmas tune. Our White Christmas was caused by a snow-thawing fog that lasted until after 1pm. It was quite impressive. And rather calming.

This year’s Christmas was a bit unusual, not least because we opened presents on Christmas Eve. Granny in the hospital also added to the oddness. Thanks, btw, to all of you Granny well-wishers.

It was looking pretty bad for her. She wasn’t eating, and her hospital psychosis was rather pronounced. She remembered us granddaughters when we visited her on the 23rd, but she was confused as to where she was & wanted to go home with us. (No surprise there – I wouldn’t want to be in the hospital either!) On the 24th, dad, Amy & I visted and she was even loopier. She hadn’t been eating (with her intestinal complaint, there really wasn’t any place for food to go!) and was confused as to who we were. Christmas morning, she was just awfully sleepy. But later on Christmas, they finally had success with the intestinal complaint. And when dad & I visited yesterday, she knew who I was and had eaten some breakfast. And later, talked with Aunt Becky on the phone and was feisty. That’s a good sign. Granny’s naturally feisty. 🙂

So, perhaps Granny will finally get back to normal. There will probably be some transition before she can go back to Becky’s house. But here’s hoping she’ll be home as soon as possible.

I’m currently at elsaf‘s place and the two of us will soon be driving to judiang‘s house. I hope to update more about my vacation thus far when I get there. Here’s hoping the drive is smooth & detour-free!

Merry Christmas!

Yay! It’s Christmas today! And in our recent tradition of having nontraditional Christmases, we actually opened all of our presents last night. It was fun opening presents in the evening. For one thing, there was wine instead of coffee. Heh. It took over 2 hours to get everything opened (with occasional breaks for food & stuff). Mom was originally thinking she might have gotten more presents for Amy than anyone (an Amy Christmas), but it turns out it was a Dad Christmas after all. Yay dad! (One of the presents he got, however, was the replacement order of jumping beans from Oriental Trading. Mom said she’d had 2 boxes sent to my place with dad’s presents. And I got 2 boxes one day. And didn’t examine the labels all THAT well – and neither did mom. She wrapped the boxes without opening, and voila! Dad opens a box to find my jumping beans. We all laughed.)

Now, there were rumors that Santa was still going to come around last night, so we did put out our stockings. He even left 2 stockings here for the parental units. Amy will be arriving shortly to help me carry the stockings over (*wink wink*) but also to open Leo’s presents for him. His lack of opposable thumbs does make it hard to open presents.

I’ll probably report in more detail about the day in another post. I just wanted to get my “Merry Christmas” out before the day was over. Hope everyone reading is having a nice End to December, regardless of which holidays, if any, that you celebrate.

Holiday Goings On

Things started off wonderfully this holiday season. Mom & I got up early and headed off to Curves and then to mom’s Weight Watchers meeting. (They had some funny Weight Loss Carols that were played.) Then we popped off to Walmart to pick up two family-sized pizzas from Papa Murphy’s. They make up the pizzas to order, then you bake them yourself. These were for supper. And then it was back home to pick up Papa so we could head off to the airport.

Amy & Rachel arrived in Ohio just fine and only a little late (darn that Detroit airport!). We had a nice lunch at Max & Erma’s and then scooted on home. Mom’s brothers were going to join us for supper (hence the pizza) since the girls head back to Minnesota before the Anderson gathering. Folks all napped and I returned home to goof off (and write my journal entry).

Uncle Bob & Aunt Madeline arrived first, followed by Uncle Doug, Aunt Charlene and finally Patty, my cousin. We all squeezed around the kitchen table for pizza, chips, and popcorn popped in Gramma’s old kettle. (Doug recognized it right away.) We had a nice evening chatting, eating, and laughing. I ate too much (no surprise there).

The next day was our day off. Heh. We decided to spend it shopping. CD Connection to pick up an Amy gift, the pet store for Leo’s present, then K’s for lunch. K’s is a greasy spoon (aka diner) that’s been in Troy since 1935. I got a cheeseburger, fries, and malted milk. Very yummy. And greasy. The way cheeseburgers are meant to be. We then headed off to Kohl’s where I found a bedspread for my winter sheets. It’s flannel and had matching shams & bedskirt all together. I also got a spare set of snowman flannel sheets for when my current winter sheets wear out. Some more Christmas presents were found & bought. And our final stop of the shopping experience was Krogers, for all of the groceries we’d need for the holidays.

Once we got back, I dumped my stuff off in my house. When I got back to the folks’ house, I found out they had a phone call from Aunt Becky – they were waiting on the squad to come & pick up Granny. So mom & dad headed off to Granny’s and followed the ambulance to the emergency room. Granny was having intestinal woes (TMI) but in the process of helping her with that, they found out her blood had gotten too thin and she was bleeding internally. Eep! Had she not had the intestinal complaint, they wouldn’t have found the blood chemistry problem and she probably would have passed away that evening. Yikes!

The good news is that they caught it in time. They were able to stabilize her condition and they admitted her to ICU that night. Mom & dad stayed with her the whole time, finally coming home after 11pm or so. Poor Granny!

Today, Amy, Rachel & I went to visit Granny in ICU. She recognized us OK, but she did have a lot of confusion. She asked about Grandma Lowry (either her grandmother or mother – I’m not sure which). She was convinced that mom & dad were in a car accident and was relieved when we told her that they were both home and fine. It was sad to see her with such confusion, but she is eating and drinking. Not a lot, but it’s something. Her blood pressure is fairly normal now. They still have the intestinal complaint to deal with, so she has that to contend with. But they’ll do what they can for her. When the folks get home from visiting, we’ll find out of there’s anything new.

After visiting Granny, we headed to the Night Sky Cafe for lunch. Grilled cheese on sourdough with tomato & ham, plus a bowl of broccoli cheddar soup, was my lunch. I bought lunch for the girls too. Then off to Wynan’s for coffee (for the girls) and cocoa (peppermint, for me). A stop in The Bakehouse for a chocolate chip cookie split three ways, and we were done with the downtown. We stopped at Krogers once more to pick up something for the parentals, then back home.

I returned home to form the dried beef cheeseballs I made this morning. One for tonight at Granny’s (even though she won’t be there – alas!), one for tomorrow night when we open presents, and two to take along to elsaf‘s. One for the Doctor Who Viewing Party (where her brother and his g/f will join us to watch The Christmas Invasion!) and the other for when Elsa, judiang and I get together in Chicago.

While typing this up, I got a call from CD Connection- the other CD that I ordered is in, so I should probably go get it before the party tonight. Then I can wrap it tonight so it’ll be ready for tomorrow. Yay! I love Christmas!

Granny, get well!

It’s Beginning to Feel a lot like Christmas

I had so much fun recently rereading my LJ entries during last Christmas season, that I’ve decided to try and get as much stuff about this holiday down so that I can remember it as well as I remember last year’s.

Yesterday was our last day of school before Christmas break. As we’ve done for a number of years, we have Spirit of Giving Day. After students make donations to the Pleasant Hill Food Pantry (canned goods or $1) they can sign up for fun things to do during the school day. There are many activities and in my room, it’s Euchre & Card Games. As I love Euchre & other card games, I love hosting this for the high school kids. The first session was mostly seniors & juniors exchanging presents with each other. That was fun to watch. But the other sessions did have games going on. I played Sequence for the first time (a student brought it and Uno) and liked it. Must get that. Played a game of Uno with a group of sophomore & junior (and one senior) boys that looked as though it would never end. It did, right as the session ended. Watched folks play Phase 10 (which is similar to Shanghai Rum). Played spoons with a large group of sophomore girls (and one boy). Finally got to play some euchre, and finished off with a couple of Sequence games. Fun stuff, even if I usually didn’t win. 🙂

Lunch was Papa John’s pizza in the gym (along with some Chex Mix that the FCCLA made for me). And the day was finished with a Pep Assembly that wasn’t too horrible. Well, except for when the cheerleaders pitted 6 male teachers with 6 female teachers to do Pom Pom letters. The men were to spell out NHS with their pom poms. We women were to spell out RED. I kept explaining this to the other 5 women on our team. And they kept trying to make up some new cheer or other. And ended up with some “classic” called Watermelon. I just stood there looking frustrated (well, a bit of overacting for the audience – but yeah, it did annoy the anal retentive person within me) while they did what they weren’t supposed to, but ended up winning anyhoo. I thought the guys did a good job on their NHS, however. 🙂 One of the lady teachers later said “You know, if we’d been graded on a rubric instead of on style, we’d’ve lost.” Heh.

At 1pm, students were dismissed and it wasn’t long after that that our respective principals let us go too. Six of us teachers had plans for shopping and the early dismissal worked nicely into those plans. (The original plan had been to do this the previous Thursday, but the weather had other plans for us.) We all headed off to the Little Professor book store in Troy. I spent lots of money on my little cousins and got a hunk of my Christmas shopping done. Yay! Then onto a little boutique shop on the way to the square. I didn’t get anything there, but it was fun to look around. Once in downtown Troy we stopped in several shops. In the Amish furniture shop, I got more stuff to finish off everyone except Leo. Yay! The Bake House was also one of our stops, so I got a loaf of sourdough bread (sliced on their bread slicer – the coolest thing since, erm, sliced bread). Oh, and some filled croissants for breakfast. Yay!

We finished off our lovely evening at La Piazza, a nice Italian restaurant also in downtown Troy. The food, as always, was excellent. And the conversation with my 5 co-workers (or cow-orkers- a term I introduced to them much to their amusement) was very lively and funny. I really love the people I work with. There were only six of us who went this time, though we’d originally had more planned to go for the Thursday event. Perhaps we’ll get more together in another trip.

So my last day of work in 2005 was a grand day. Full of fun, friendships, and food. And that’s just the start to the holiday. Amy & Rachel are safely home as of 11:45am today. We’ve already had one family gathering and we’ve got more to come. I think I’ll have as much fun this year as last. 🙂

A Tech Christmas Poem

Tomorrow when my users check their e-mails, they’ll see this poem.

A Poem for Christmas by Trina, aged 34

‘Twas the night before Christmas
And all through the school
Several computers were on
And that wasn’t cool.

The computer techs were nestled
All snug in their beds
While visions of Open Source Software
Danced in their heads.

When out in the night sky
There arose such a blast
‘Twas thunder & lightning
Neither of which were forecast

The computers went down
The servers shut too
And several network hubs
All went “boo hoo!”

Some computers when down
Will never wake up
And this costs us moolah
Which we never have enough*

So the moral of this poem
If it isn’t obvious to you
Turn off your computers
Oh, and Merry Christmas, too!

*Yeah yeah, not the world’s greatest rhyme. So sue me!

Baking Day (Part 1)

A tradition for as long as I can remember, mom and I spend a day baking up all the Christmas goodies for our upcoming gatherings. Sometimes it spreads over two days, like this year. We started by heading out to get supplies. First, I had to get my haircut cuz people were beginning to notice it was getting LONG. (Long for me, BTW, isn’t horribly long. I can’t ever stand it enough to get to that stage.) But then we went to Wally World and got supplies. Lunch was Chinese Buffet. Then home again to start baking.

We started with some snicker doodles that mom bought from a co-worker. These were pre-made & frozen dough balls, ready for baking. The teenage daughter of this co-worker was trying to get money for a school or athletics related trip. And she’s a good dough maker. Then we made the chocolate chip cookies (aka Lindy Cookies – so named after my mom, Linda). We used some really great cookie sheets from KitchenAid which made baking easy-peasey. Mom made the dough for Ice Box cookies (aka butterscotch cookies). Those were then put into loafs & out into the back porch for ice boxing. 🙂 We hit something of an impasse here. We needed the recipe for candy buckeyes, and our favorite recipe was in a cookbook now at the Lake. So I called Granny & asked to borrow their copy. I headed off to visit with her & aunt Becky & pick up the book.

When I got back, it was supper time. I ate light – apple, orange, cashews – and returned to the folks’. Mom had made her praline mix (evil addictive munchy stuff) while I was at Granny’s. We then got to work on the peanut butter innards for buckeyes. That’s one of those things you just have to do by hand, so before too long, I was up to my elbows in peanut butter, powdered sugar, and butter. I then rolled the little buckeyes & we put them out in the back porch to cool. While I’d been rolling, mom was working one another of my favorite holiday treats, floor-sweeping cake. It doesn’t actually have floor sweepings, it just looks like it. 🙂 By then, it was nearing 9pm, so we had Advent & I returned home.

Tomorrow, we dip the buckeyes, bake the Ice Box cookies, and make peanut butter blossoms (aka nipple cookies – you know, the peanut butter ones with Hershey’s kisses in ’em). Oh yeah, and there’s the cheesecake cupcakes. I think we’ll be done then. 🙂

If I’m feeling in a generous mood, I might put the recipes of some of these delectables up in another post. Or I could just let y’all suffer. (judiang & elsaf will get to sample many of these treats this year – unless we eat them all before I get off to visit with them!)

Soup Making Day

Thanks to the ice and now snow being dumped on us, school is closed again today. Works for me! I’ve spent the morning making mom’s veggie soup. Here’s hoping I do a capable job of it cuz mom & dad are joining me for lunch. The soup is better with cooking, so they won’t be getting it at its prime, but it should be tasty.

Several of my coworkers and I were going to go shopping (and eating) today after work, but, alas, with work closed, it’s been canceled. So perhaps we can do it next Tuesday instead. Tuesday, meanwhile, is our last day of school before break. And best of all, the break lasts until January 4th. So I’ll have two days to recover from my birthday. (The birthday, btw, will be spent with judiang & elsaf at Elsa’s. 🙂 (Oh! Elsa,, the parade isn’t until the 2nd! Maybe the 1st can be movie day & the second sleep in & brunch day?)

It’s very pretty outside – the ice on the trees has allowed the snow to stick nicely on them. Of course, ice on trees is never good – leads to falling on things like power lines. They say we’ll get 3″ or more snow. Ice might be icky, but I don’t mind snow. 🙂

Well, looks like chemistry won’t be having their test over naming & formula writing until after Christmas break. We’ll have tomorrow for a review, then Monday is Making Gak day. Tuesday is “Spirit of Giving Day” which used to be called “Christmas Fun Day.” With donations to the Pleasant Hill Food Pantry, students get to spend the day doing fun things like playing euchre, charades, Monopoly, volleyball, etc. Movies are also available for watching too. Physics is building toothpick bridges from now until Christmas Fun Day. So they’ve got an easy load for the rest of 2005. We might have to have another build day when we get back – usually we test the bridges the day we get back. We’ll see how tomorrow & Monday go. (That’s 3 periods of building for them, so it might be enough.)

The folks and I have finally started doing Advent. 🙂 Yup, 3 weeks in and we’re finally lighting candles. We have to get in practice because Amy & Rachel join us next Wednesday (YAY!) and they’ve been doing Advent since it began. It’ll be great to have the girls here with us over Christmas. Actually, they leave Christmas evening, so we’re going to do our gift exchange Christmas Eve. Dunno if I can do it! (Actually, I probably can. I’m in it for the family togetherness & the gift giving & receiving. The date is really arbitrary.)

I think I’ve discovered why Leo’s been eating his food so damn fast. I think that he thinks there’s someone eating his food. So he feels he has to hurry up and eat his food before someone else does. What he doesn’t realize is that the person eating his food so quickly is HIM. Stupid cat. 🙂 I’ve decided I should have called him Garfield. He is so obsessed with food these days. Maybe he intends to hibernate. 🙂

Anyhoo, since it’s a snow day, I don’t have any real plans. So I think I’ll go do them. 🙂