There’s something deeply satisfying about taking a day or two at year’s end to regroup, reorganize, reflect. In high school and college, I used to set aside time at New Year’s to re-read all of my old journals and diaries; that tradition stopped when I stopped keeping a diary, but I still like the [...]
Tags: christmas, strange horizons
Posted in personal, science fiction | 2 Comments »>You know how some family traditions don’t even really look like family traditions until you get some distance from them? If it’s just what everyone does, you don’t even notice. I’ve said before that I never really felt Italian until I left New Jersey; after leaving the East Coast entirely, I’ve felt more [...]
Tags: christmas, comedy of errors, family, food
Posted in personal | 2 Comments »>Hash browns.
Originally uploaded by Susan Groppi
Bette’s is one of those places that’s crowded even on slow days, sitting right in the middle of the brunch culture around here, Bette’s and Mama’s and Rick & Ann’s and Lois the Pie Queen, a handful of other places. This particular Saturday, three days before Christmas in the [...]
Tags: christmas, food, photos, shopping
Posted in personal | 3 Comments »>Today, the first trash-pickup day after Epiphany, is the day where the streets are lined with the dessicated corpses of Christmas trees. I keep trying to give this a German name, something something “die töten Tannenbäume,” but I can’t quite make it work.
Posted in personal | 5 Comments »>Holiday meals prepared in a two-day period: two. (One for our Christmas Eve party, and one for just the two of us on Christmas Day.)
Familiar standby recipes used: three. (Gingersnap cookies for the party, flank steak and roasted root vegetables for us.)
Familiar standby recipes tweaked into new and exciting variations: two. (For [...]
I noticed it too late to do it right, but I did finally notice a number of people marking the winter solstice by telling family stories on the webjournals. It’s a really charming idea, and an especially appropriate solstice celebration. That’s part of what I love about the confluence of winter holidays, [...]
Tags: christmas, holidays, solstice
Posted in personal | 2 Comments »>Where Christmas is concerned, I have very little shame. I love all the goofy decorative trappings of the holidays, without any reservation or hesitation. Christmas exploits all of my sentimental weaknesses all at once. This is one of those things about which I have no tendency for cynicism or over-intellectualization.
Today, the project [...]
Tags: christmas, christmas tree
Posted in personal | 2 Comments »>
Recent Comments