It's been very busy here--Dale's parents arrived a little over two weeks ago (right around the time my blogging dropped off!), and the time always seems to speed by when there's company around. More people to have a chat with, more places to go, games to play in the evening . . . we've done lots of Yahtzee this time.
Today we got everything for Thanksgiving dinner, and hopefully for the next few days afterwards as well. It's kind of amazing how much preparation it takes to have a calm holiday dinner (at least for me). Yesterday, on Monday, I made my menu and then my shopping list. Today I went shopping and found a home for all the food in the fridge & pantry. Tomorrow I will do nearly 10 things in advance of the big day (make cranberry sauce, saute veg for stuffing, get items ready for making the giblet gravy, prepare veg for making stock from the carcass, set the table, plan the timeline for what needs to be done when on Thursday--including when I can fit a shower in!, etc.) . . . I guess once I've done a few more of these, I won't have to do the timeline, but otherwise it's still a lot of work. And I wouldn't skip it for anything! I read in the paper last weekend that fewer and fewer families are having a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal these days and are going out instead, and I think that's a shame. I'd miss the wonderful smells and the leftover stuffing. One nice thing about Thanksgiving is that Dale and I don't have to hide the stuffing from Mom & Dad--at Christmas time they both tend to get up the day afterwards about 6 a.m. and have a plate of stuffing & gravy for breakfast, and by the time Dale and I get around to looking for some for lunch, there's barely any left!
I hope everyone has a lovely Thanksgiving, and I wish Meredith especially good luck in hosting her first dinner--I'm sure it will be wonderful.
My dad frequently gives me a hard time about one thing or another. Over the last couple of years (since I acquired a salt crock), he's needled me about how salts can possibly taste different since they're all just NaCL. Here are some answers better than I could phrase (I said it had to do with how they were processed, but I was unable to coherently or persuasively provide any details):
--All salt is from the sea. Processing and the amount of additives and natural minerals determine the different between table salt and sea salt. The quantity and type of trace minerals create subtle flavor variations.
--Regular table salt (mined from underground deposits formed by ancient seas) has minerals--called impurities--removed and anti-caking agents added. "Natural" sea salts are not processed to remove color and do not contain additives; they have a crunchy texture and a lighter taste than table salt.
--Gourmet sea salt is harvested by channeling seawater into clay ponds. Wind and sun make the water evaporate while salt crystals form. Natural minerals color the crystals from ivory to red.
--Expensive/gourmet salts should be used as finishing salts only, sprinkled on cooked foods--since they dissolve in liquid, all nuances are lost when mixed with cooking food.
--If you choose to use large salt crystals in a salt mill (to get a finer texture--salt doesn't go stale like pepper does, so it's not necessary to use a mill for freshness), make sure the grinding mechanism is ceramic or hard plastic rather than metal, which is corroded by salt.
Note: This information came (sometimes verbatim) from an AP article that was in today's Houston Chronicle.
A frequent topic of discussion on my genealogy software mailing list is how best to preserve and/or backup one's data; I've forwarded some of the messages on to Daddy, since he's been in charge of the family photo CD. He recently returned the favor with a link to an article in Information Week. It's a good article that sums up a lot of what's been reported over the last few years, and the most important thing I noted was the finding that every unreadable disc the author had was "covered with a glue-on paper label from a print-it-yourself CD label-maker kit. Several of these labeled CDs were, in fact, totally unreadable by every means I tried (including special data-recovery software); all the data on those CDs is just plain gone. My best guess is the glue on these do-it-yourself labels interacted with either the foil or the dye, rendering the CDs useless."
Check out the whole article for the full story; it also includes links to previous articles on the integrity of CD-Rs and CD-RWs.
Ever since I started feeling better with this pregnancy, I have been a whirlwind of activity in our home. This sure is a different experience than when I was pregnant with Jonathan! Now I know first-hand what's coming, which is why I'm in such a hurry to clean up these things that have been languishing for months or years. I don't think I've filed a single bill or official document since we moved into this house 4-1/2 years ago. They are all piled up in our bedroom closet!
So, over the last 9 days or so, I've done the following: put up more bookshelves in our bedroom and moved stuff out of the guest room onto the new shelves (my husband struggled with the concept of more bookshelves for less than five minutes--I was proud of him for accepting the situation so gracefully!); reorganized and cleaned the bookshelves in the guest room; cleaned out the guest room closet; winnowed out Jonathan's toys from his area in the den; cleaned the freezer, the junk drawer in the kitchen, the upper and lower cabinets next to the refrigerator, the drawer full of kitchen gadgets, made a dent in our master closet, paid the bills, gotten new rugs & towels for the master bath and new rugs for the guest bath, cleaned out the linen closet (which also holds all my candles, so you can imagine what that was like), organized part of the utility room . . . I have discovered an amazing ruthless streak in myself to recognize when I am unlikely to use something again and to just throw it away instead of leaving it at the back of a cabinet or drawer "just in case". Must have something to do with having children, limited time, and limited space; I was certainly never this way prior to Jonathan.
Joy & Brian, Dale's parents, arrive tomorrow afternoon for their much-anticipated fall visit. We are all very excited about their return and look forward to the next few weeks--they'll be here until 5 December. Jonathan woke up this morning and said, "Dad's parents are coming tomorrow!"
Even with all of my delaying, by the time people actually started arriving, everything was under control. I had even already measured the coffee into the coffeemaker for dessert, so that when it was time all I had to do was flip the switch, and voila! there was coffee. It was nice to see that I could remember how to be organized and efficient when "entertaining". And I can see that it's good to have this brief interlude now, since with another one on the way my organization is going to go right back down the tube! (I can finally talk about our pregnancy in my blog now that Brian & Joy are en route--we will tell them in person tomorrow afternoon.)
For those who might be interested, here were the selections I offered to vote on at the book group meeting:
The True Sources of the Nile, Sarah Stone
That Old Ace in the Hole, Annie Proulx
"And So It Goes": Adventures in Television, Linda Ellerbee
the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, Mark Haddon
Lying Awake, Mark Salzman
The Siege, Helen Dunmore
The Clearing, Tim Gautreaux
I had read the Linda Ellerbee book a long time ago (it's falling apart I've read it so many times--it was originally Mom & Dad's), and I also read the Mark Salzman book, which is wonderful, absolutely wonderful. The first-round vote came down to three books instead of our usual two: the curious incident, Lying Awake, and The Siege--the final pick was the curious incident. I haven't read it yet as our next meeting isn't until 19 November and I like the book to be fresh in my head. I was pleased this was our choice--hopefully the anticipation will be worth the wait.