Archive for December, 2007

Inspired by this article in the Times of London, I holed up and took a lovely, restorative vacation at home after Christmas. Christmas was lovely — we all had a great time. There was lots of food and wine and by ten that night we had six kids under five doing the Toddler Disco...
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I got all the boxes in the mail — granted, the last two, to my aunt and my grandmother (who live together) didn’t go out until yesterday — but they celebrate Christmas on whichever day next week is most convenient — and well, my grandmother is 96, and while she still has most of...
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I managed to get the last packaged in the mail this afternoon and I’m swamped putting out some last-minute fires at my Corporate Job. In the meantime — check out this five-part investigative piece on the Ameya Preserve that New West is publishing. I’ve only read part one thus far, but seems like a cogent...
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It’s been a weekend of cooking cooking cooking … with a couple of small breaks for tree trimming and kids’ recitals … So if you’re on my Christmas list — stop reading now. Go away. Come back after your box arrives. For the rest of you — here’s the weekend: I made truffles for my grandmother. I...
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Because too many of the people on my Christmas list read my blog, I can’t be too specific — but let’s say that this weekend is all about baking — cookies, cake, pate (well, it’s baked anyhow) and chocolate-chile truffles for my grandmother — I have a hunch that it might be another lost...
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The least interesting part of Doris Lessing’s Nobel Prize speech has been getting a lot of attention this week — the part where she claims that the speed by which the internet has been developed has led to a sort of mesmerism by screen, and has subsequently caused a serious devaluation of the book...
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I’ve been using the shreddy stuff out of my shredder to pack boxes with. It’s recycleable, something I’d have to throw out or compost myself, and since I have a huge backlog of old manuscript paged, a nearly-endless resource. I packed the black Chamba pot I sent to my cousin Elizabeth in shredded credit...
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The past few years I’ve been giving people food presents — we all have so much stuff in our lives, so why do we need more little objects? Particularly for those folks on our lists who we love, and to whom we want to give a little something, but who aren’t family or the...
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No matter how much French and Italian food I might cook the rest of the year, for me, Christmas is all about English Food (well, and German — I did grow up in the Midwest after all). I don’t understand people who have turkey for Christmas — people! you just had a turkey! Branch...
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There was a terrific little piece on Zen Habits last week, Faith in Humanity: How to Bring People Closer, and Restore Kindness. I read it right after I’d come back from paying my local utilities bill — there never seems any point to paying that bill by mail since the office is just down...
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