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Meme Monday
This isn’t truly a meme, but instead some words of wisdom that I gathered from my bloggy friend Roma 8 years ago, that she posted on Facebook. Does Roma still have a blog? I can’t find her old one, but honestly, I’m not even sure how to look. Should have kept her on the sidebar maybe, but then again, if I removed it it was likely because she wasn’t maintaining it anymore. ANYWAY, the message is timely and one that I try to keep in mind, especially during the holidays. Resist everything except what your heart dictates. If it makes you happy to polish the silver, go for it. If…
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Mulder’s Fabulous Friday!
Hi everyone, this is J’s puppy-boy (PB), Mulder, and I’m here to tell you about the Fabulous Friday that I just had! I have three bosses, my Big Boss, (Ted), my Medium Boss (Julie, aka, J), and my Little Boss, Maya. Medium Boss and I started out the day with a nice walk downtown, She thought we might try to find some new pianos to take my picture with, but they are gone. She was sad about this, but really, I can’t play piano very well, and during rainy season, it is probably a bad idea. Is she even thinking? In the place of the pianos, there is a lot…
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Thanksgiving Prep
This is the current situation at my house. I have washed the good china, and just finished polishing the silver. I’m not going to use our good crystal glasses this year, they are too fragile and I don’t want to risk them getting broken. Back when we got married, almost 30 years ago, couples registered for china, silver, and crystal. We don’t use them often, but we do use them a couple of times a year. Sometimes for Valentine’s Day, always for Canadian Thanksgiving, and then if we have Christmas or U.S. Thanksgiving here. We celebrate two Thanksgivings, just because it is fun. Ted was born in Canada, though his…
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Friday Randomness – 5 Things
Today’s post will be 5 Things I’m thinking about.
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A Million Things
Beckett at The Birchwood Pie Project posted that the best book she has read this year is A Million Things, by Emily Spurr. Coincidentally, I was looking for a new book to listen to via Audible. I usually have 2 books going at once, a physical book that I read before bed (generally getting a page or two in before falling asleep), and an audio book that I listen to while I walk Mulder, while I cook, and sometimes during my work day if I have down time. A Million Things is told from Rae’s point of view. Rae is a 10 1/2 year old girl who lives with her…
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Wordless Wednesday
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NaBloPoMo
Here’s a random photo from a recent morning walk. When Maya was little we always entered this park through a local trail, and didn’t know what it’s official name was, so we called it ‘Elmo Park’, after her favorite Sesame Street character. I realized the other day that my blogging etiquette has gone to hell. I mentioned on November 1st that I was going to try to post every day, but at that point I didn’t know that there was anyone trying to host a group of bloggers with a list and so on. I wandered over to NGS’s blog a few days in, and found that she was participating,…
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Hummus Bowls with Spiced Lamb
Most weeks, I do the cooking around here Monday – Thursday, we get take out on Friday (started during the pandemic to support local restaurants, and kept the habit), and Ted cooks on Saturdays and Sundays. This last Saturday, he was planning to make pork chops for dinner, along with some Brussels sprouts, but was looking for something to make for our daughter, who is (mostly) vegetarian. She will eat a bit of fish, but pretty much limits that to sushi and fish and chips. He came across this recipe, and thought it might work well with some Beyond Beef. Then he thought, hey, let’s skip the pork chops and…
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Picture of the Day – Cemetery in Vincennes
My cousin and I didn’t go to any of the famous cemeteries in Paris when we were there in September, but we did happen upon this walled in cemetery on the same street as our hotel in Vincennes. Knowing nothing about it, we didn’t explore and see if we could find any famous people there. Looking at this picture, that fourth grave has a lot of flowers, perhaps a recent addition? I like the calm of cemeteries, and these multi person tombs are lovely. But somehow it feels strange to explore too much, so we just looked around for a few minutes and then got on our way. I did…
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Get Out the Vote
It’s Saturday morning, and I’m starting my day with Wordle, a cup of tea, and some post card writing. I have a stash of generic looking postcards that I bought a few years ago on Amazon, and I’m sending encouragement to registered Democrats in Georgia, encouraging them to get out and vote, and re-elect Senator Warnock in the run-off election on December 6th. If you’re inclined to join me, time is short. I go through an organization called Tony the Democrat, and once you sign up with them, they will text and/or email you a list of addresses, as few as 5 and as many as 50. I have 14…
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Cheese Glorious Cheese
Here you see my cousin Carey, talking to the Fromager at the little cheese shop in Vincennes, the town where we spent our nights (and some days) just outside of the Paris city limits. I told you about the day we were too worn out from our travels, including lots of driving and late nights, to stick with our initial plan of driving to Versailles. We stayed local, got massages, had a glass of wine and watched people, then got some food to eat, brought it back to our time-share, and watched a movie, ate bread, cheese, salami, and drank wine. And did laundry. It was a nice, lazy day.…
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Onion Soup in France
This sad, sad picture is of our dinner one evening in Cannes. We had had a lovely lunch (I think this was the day we took the boat to Saint Tropez and had a big lunch, so we weren’t terribly hungry), so we thought we would a light dinner. Carey had been wanting French Onion soup, so when I saw ‘Soupe a l’oignon’ on a menu, we decided to give it a try. I don’t think it’s that big of a thing in the South of France, and we hadn’t seen it on any menus yet. This was the soup we received…the broth was not the dark, rich broth, the…
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Picture of the Day – Outside Sacre Coeur
First off, let me apologize for the inordinate use of the word ‘amazing’ in yesterday’s post. The fact that the croissant was delicious and perfectly prepared is not something to cause great surprise. You kind of expect that in France. It was lazy writing. I considered editing the post and finding some other adjectives, but decided to leave it as is. I like this picture of a street musician and his cat, entertaining the tourists on the steps of Sacre Coeur. He’s even wearing a beret. The messy ‘No Entry’ sign on the door takes a bit from the picture, but I like his cat.
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Pictures of the Day – Fruit in Mougins
We absolutely fell in love with the local boulangerie in Mougins. We began our days by walking down our little hill and getting a baguette, croissant, or pastry for breakfast. The quality was AMAZING, and the staff were wonderful. Above is breakfast one day, amazing croissant, amazing fruit, amazing French butter and locally produced jam. The tea is British, I brought my tea bags from home, which I buy from the local Indian shops and are imported from England. The ashtray is useless, but I left it in the picture because it seemed very French to me. Due to COVID, there was often a line in front of the store.…
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Picture of the Day – Shopping for Gifts
While in France, I did a little gift shopping. I bought Christmas gifts for Ted and Maya, and for my siblings and Mother figures (that’s my step mom and my mother in law). One thing I wanted for Ted was a nice shirt, but not something for work. Too much like getting school clothes as a gift. There was a shirt I liked at a shop in Vincennes, but I wasn’t sure of the size, and I wasn’t sure it was something he would actually wear, and it was almost $200. I would absolutely spend $200 to get Ted a shirt from France that I knew he would love and…