Denial

(thanks, Carol)

2008's First Christmas Joke

Three men died on Christmas Eve and were met by Saint Peter at the pearly gates. 'In honor of this holy season' Saint Peter said, 'You must each possess something that symbolizes Christmas to get into heaven.'

• The first man fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a lighter. He flicked it on. 'It represents a candle', he said. 'You may pass through the pearly gates' Saint Peter said.
• The second man reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. He shook them and said, 'They're bells.' Saint Peter said 'You may pass through the pearly gates'.
• The third man started searching desperately through his pockets and finally pulled out a pair of women's panties. St. Peter looked at the man with a raised eyebrow and asked, 'And just what do those symbolize?' The man replied, 'These are Carols.'

(thanks, Linda)

Thanks

Thanks to all of you who expressed concern about my meltdown over my mother's doctor.

I've vented and I'm over it, so you all can quit worrying about me now ...

No, she won't be going to that doctor any more.

(And for those of you who may have children in med school, make note and tell the story so that there may be a doctor out there in the future who, while being a very special specialist, can respect the time of common people ;-)

Snowy Morning

It's a virtual Monday for me as I was off yesterday to take my mother to a doctor's appointment. Yes, I am the poster child for the Sandwich Generation ...

I will begin with a few gripes:

I had called the doctor's office asking if what needed to be done couldn't be done by the MD who visits the nursing home where my mother lives. Oh, no! They told me, she must come in to see the specialist. Right. Ten minute consultation of nothing special with a specialist across town. Thanks for respecting my time.

Saturday I was at the AAA office in Burnsville because it showed Saturday hours on the website. Guess what? A piece of paper with "closed" written on it taped over the Saturday hours on the door.

It turns out that AAA is divided into a Minneapolis section and a Minnesota/Iowa section - if you put a St Paul zip code in to search the website for an office you won't get information on any offices over the river. I live three blocks from the river. I do not live close to Burnsville or Iowa.

That said, it's a snowy morning here in St Paul (Minneapolis too) and that makes me happy. I love snow. It's supposed to snow a few inches every other day this week so it will be pretty and white for days.

I'm about to finish my first glittens. Thankfully, Girl-child is very appreciative of hand-knit items and she will (hopefully) over look the imperfections of my design and find them useful. Boy-child gets the next pair.

I got the date balls started yesterday and so the baking is almost done. I noticed that in my previous post I got comments and e-mails on the cookies. Nobody seems to care about anything else. Maybe I'll check out the camera again and take more cookie pictures.

I also got my international drivers license yesterday. I am recognizable in the picture. That is the most I can ever hope for from a picture.

Recent Output

Folks have been asking about what types of cookies I've been making so here are some photos.

The traditional spritz cookies - Girl-child swears the Christmas trees are the best:

They're in the freezer because the boys aren't too fond of them and I don't want to eat them all. Girl-child took a small tin back to school for a treat.

Then I made some lemon cream cheese cookies which I always make - the citrus is a nice break from all the vanilla flavoring (although I use almond in the spritz, also for variety):
I love lemon. In the house they must be referred to as fossil cookies, as that's what P dubbed them years ago and that is what they will always be.

And there are these, which we called oatmeal shortbreads when I was a child but now are called logs (my children wouldn't care if none of them were round and they would be delighted if none had nuts):
They spruce up a plate rather nicely.

I still have to make date balls, but that will come later. Most of the cookies will go to Chile.

In knitting I have tried something new - Glittens:
These are for Girl-child and are an adaptation of a couple of patterns. I've been taking notes, so I hope the second one looks the same as the first.

I also finished the first Panopticon sock and have started on the second - the color is a little off but it will have to do:

And I finished Girl-child's orange socks and delivered them to her yesterday when we had lunch together in Stadium Village:
Thanks for the picture Sweet Pea, I think the color turned out quite well.

And how, you may ask, did I take pictures if P took the camera with him when he flitted of to Chile yesterday? I checked it out at the library! Can you believe that? It's a really nice camera, so I hope to check it out again!

And here are a few things I found online today:

*The congresswoman who hung up on Obama twice because she thought the phone call was a prank. Oops!

*The Hakluyt Society - wow - how cool is this? When I'm rich and famous I am going to join, although I e-mailed them today asking if they ever published anything by/about Mary Kingsley and if the answer is no that may discourage my future membership. (Note that Map Nerd was not one of the options on that quiz yesterday, but we do exist).

*The New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2008 List. This is a list worth examining. I get a lot of lists, being on a few librarian listservs, but this one holds promise. Now all I have to do is remember the list and wait until they are out in paperback.

*Coffee Art. Seriously. Check it out. It's a memoir in art - kind of reminds me of both Love, Loss and What I Wore and A Postcard Memoir. And another thing which I can't discuss because it's a Christmas surprise. Love the concept, love the effect.