Journal Entries
...And you thought I'd already done my Christmas journal entry for 2006...
Posted Dec 26, 2006
This has been an odd Christmas.
First of all, Amy+ has been in the UK since September, working on her Masters, and wasn't able to come home for Christmas this year. She won't be able to get home until late March, and even then only for a couple of weeks, then she'll be back there again until at least September. 
So right away, Christmas is very different in the Scott household.
Shorty finally made it home from her university on the 20th, so it's been nice to have at least one child at home - even though she's definitely an adult, not a little kid!
Since we didn't have any kids here urging us on, we were really late getting the Christmas decorations up, so that was another odd thing.
The weather has also been unusually warm for this time of year, so it hasn't really even felt much like Christmas. I don't know how people who live in say for instance Palm Springs can stand having Christmas in such warm weather. Something just seems so wrong about it, especially when you're used to cold Christmasses. But it was a very late Spring this year, a very late summer, a very late fall, and now apparently we're having a very late winter. Some years are like this. There was a year a couple decades ago that Christmas day was in the 80'sF
, so it's not unheard of, even though this year hasn't been nearly that warm since about October.
We normally go to my mom's for dinner on Christmas day (2-1/2 hours from here), but she's getting on in years, and for the last couple holiday meals, I've gone to her place the night before, in order to be there early enough to help her cook the big family meal, since it's just too much work for her to do all by herself any more. But Lord Scott really wanted me with the rest of our little family on Christmas morning, and didn't really want to do Christmas morning at Mom's instead. So we suggested to Mom that perhaps we should do a Christmas Eve dinner at her home instead, and after talking to my siblings, they all agreed that it was a good idea, since they both always have Christmas day plans with their inlaws too, which makes for a very long, rushed day for them, what with all the travel involved.
Rather than cooking a Turkey, with dressing and the whole works, on Christmas Eve,since I knew everyone would be having turkey at their various dinners on Christmas day, I suggested that perhaps we should have a beef roast instead. It's a bit simpler meal to prepare too.
So Mom bought a standing rib roast, which I'd never cooked before (Are you kidding? Like I can afford something like that! 
) and neither has she, so I had to look up how to do this on the internet. Now you have to understand that Mom believes all meat should be cooked very well done, not even the least bit pink in the middle, and the directions I was finding said that it would truly ruin the meat if you cooked it well done. Uh-oh.
I explained all this to her, and decided I'd try to get it as well done as possible, without ruining it. The meat thermometer read 160F, but when we cut it, the meat was still quite colorful inside. Everyone in the extended family said it was wonderful that way, and I made sure Mom had an outside slice, which was well done enough for her tastes.
There were 14 of us at the table. And another in a baby carrier. And another on the way. The baby is my great-nephew, who looks just like my dad. 
He was born about 6 weeks ago, but wasn't even due until tomorrow, so he's still a tiny thing, and his cry sounds like a kitten. So sweet. 
Everyone had a chance to hold him, cooing and fawning over him. My other nephew's wife is also expecting, but hopefully she'll wait until her baby is full term to deliver! 
So the meal yesterday went very well. Everyone loved the beef 
, except for my sister who doesn't really care for beef to begin with, and her daughter, who as a teenager seems to have decided that she doesn't really need to eat much of anything at all. She apparently thinks of herself as a vegetarian, although she will occasionally eat chicken and fish, but doesn't eat vegetables. I'm not quite sure how the designation as a vegetarian applies to her.
We had to leave Mom's to head home before the entire kitchen was cleaned up though, and there were still serving dishes and pots and pans everywhere, although we'd managed to finish up all the plates and such before leaving.
Just before crossing back over the Pennsylvania border on our way home, as it was getting dark, we were on a twisty-turny country road, and suddenly about 3 white-tail deer ran across the road in front of the car. 
I'm used to the hazards of driving on those narrow country roads wtih the blind corners around embankments and little hills that you can't see over in the southern part of Lancaster County. What with Amish buggies all over the place, you need to be very careful on those roads, especially at dusk and after dark. However, I'd completely forgotten about the hazards of deer on the roads, especially at this time of year. Luckily, we managed to stop in time, and had no more close calls with deer.
Sometime yesterday, we realized that I'd completely forgotten to buy any cranberry sauce to go with the turkey I was planning to cook for our Christmas dinner. I don't eat it, but the rest of the family does. We could have stopped at the one grocery store along the way, which just happened to still be open as we passed it, but were in too much of a hurry to get home. 
So after we got home, and had something to eat, we remembered about the cranberry sauce, and Lord Scott decided to go out in search of some. I'd offered to go instead, but for some reason he wanted to do it himself. Of course by that time, all the places that would be likely to have it were closed, which he found out as he drove from place to place, and the few places that were actually open don't carry cranberry sauce.
This should have been my sign that things weren't going to go well on the cooking front today....
I got up around 5:30 this morning to get the turkey into the oven. 
The turkey, which was only 14 lbs, had been thawing in the fridge since Thursday morning. According to the label, a 14-18 lb turkey should have thawed in the fridge in only 2-3 days time. For anyone who cares to keep score, that's 4 full days. I gave it some extra time, because experience has taught me that these things always take longer to thaw than the directions say.
The only problem though is that what I retrieved from the fridge this morning was a turkey that was still frozen rock solid.
So thus started my day of one cooking problem after another. 
I floated it in a sinkful of cold water, checking every now and then to see if it had thawed enough to be cooked. After about half an hour, I was able to pry the tip of a wing away from the body. One wing, I mean, the other one was firmly frozen in place. Another half hour later, I managed to pry the other wing loose. Still later, I wrestled a leg loose from it's icy grip, and finally the other leg. The only challenges left were getting the giblet pack out of the one cavity, and the neck out of the other one. By this time, it was already nearly 8am. I had emptied out the water and refilled the sink with cold water several times by then, but kept running cold water over the cavities to try to loosen their contents.
Finally, I managed to pull out the giblet pack, but the neck was firmly stuck in place. I ran water over it, repeatedy. Over and over. I chipped at it with a knife, and ran more water over it. Repeatedly. Finally, along about 8:30, and only because I gave up and ran HOT water into that cavity, I managed to pry the neck from it's terrible, frozen grip. I know, I know, that's not considered safe, but I was planning on popping it into the oven as soon as I could get that neck out, which is what I did.
And this was a turkey that had been "thawing" since Thursday. 
In between going 15 rounds with the turkey, I remembered that I had a bottle of cranberry juice concentrate on hand. I wondered if it would be possible to make cranberry sauce to go with the turkey? So I went on an extensive internet search for a recipe to use. Most of them called for fresh cranberries, which was really no help at all, because if I had cranberries, that would have meant I'd have been planning to make my own cranberry sauce all along. 
Finally, I came across a cranberry jelly recipe that could be made using only the juice from the cranberries - well, now we're getting somewhere! Easy enough to make too, just use 2/3 the amount of sugar that you have of juice. So I reconstitued a little cranberry juice, and got out my container of sugar...
Only to find that the sugar was nearly all gone. I was a little short on that 2/3 of the juice amount, but decided to give it a try anyway, since there wasn't much other choice. So I boiled it up, added the sugar, boiled again, and poured it into a small bowl to "set", since that's what the directions said it would do.
Well, it didn't.
So I decided I must not have boiled it long enough, and back into the pot it went to be boiled again. By this time, I'd nearly boiled it back down to the original un-reconstituted strength, with the addition of the sugar, so I figured I'd better just pour it back into the bowl and see if it would "set" this time.
Somewhere in there I cut up a loaf of bread, some onions and celery to make the dressing. At least that went well.
My timer eventually rang, which meant it was time to cover the turkey with aluminum foil to finish cooking, so I reached in the cabinet and pulled out my great big roll of aluminum foil to put over it. I reached in the box, started pulling on the sheet of foil... and pulled out all 8 inches of it. 
By this time I still wasn't dressed yet, and had turkey stuff splashed all over me. When you expect to put the turkey in the oven at 5:30 am, you simply don't get dressed first, and I'd been messing with this stuff for 4 hours by this time. Lord Scott was up and dressed so he called the closest convenience store, where not only were the open on christmas morning (
), they actually *had* some aluminum foil in stock 
, so he went out and bought some for me.
Once the turkey was finally taken care of, I had a shower, then we had our Christmas morning gift opening fest. By this time I was so worn out with the frustrations of the morning that I headed back to bed. When I woke up, I pulled the turkey out of the oven, to find that he was pretty much falling apart, which would seem to indicate he wasn't frozen any more, and might have even been cooked all the way through.
The cranberry "jelly" however still hadn't "set", it was just a thick liquid.
Shorty helped me with the rest of the meal preparations, but I almost forgot to cook the dressing. She reminded me just in time though. Our take-home lesson from this? Don't take a nap when you have a turkey in the oven!
We had our meal, finally. Shorty didn't eat any of the cranberry sauce, but Lord Scott seemed to kinda like it, different as it was. The leftovers are all put away now. It looks like we'll be having turkey everything for the next month or so.
On the good side, we called Amy+ twice today. 
Both times we managed to interrupt her meals. But it was really good to talk to her.
What I can't figure out about all this is how I can cook everything so well one day, and fail so miserably at everything I attempt to cook the next. 
Discuss this Journal entry [23]
Latest reply: Dec 26, 2006
A Merry Journal
Posted Dec 18, 2006
This journal entry is being written at the suggestion of Galaxy Babe. She's had a rather rough year, and requested that her friends post merry journals. So here goes:
My church had it's Christmas cantata this morning at the 10:15 service. It was a "homegrown" cantata, not the usual extremely formal cantata that's written to be performed by a choir of thousands, with elaborate musical scoring and dozens of parts. No, this was essentially a collection of classic carols, modern carols and some black gospel songs, interspersed with a few appropriate readings.
Oh and before I forget, the only carol the entire church sang today (before the cantata started) was Silent Night - accompanied only by guitar, just as it was originally. Granted, the guitarist who accompanied us tends towards a country/western sound, and I doubt that's the style it was originally written in 
, but it still was sweet to sing it to guitar accompaniament, rather than with the organ or piano. The only thing better is the way that we used to always sing Silent Night while the choir sang Peace, Peace to end advent season services. Lovely sound, the two pieces of music blend beautifully. I'm not sure why we never do that any more, but choir directors come and go, and some have their own preferences for what music to use
At any rate, back to the cantata, but first a little bit of background:
I attend a 
church. No, not an actual rainbow, but despite the fact that the older members of the church are all lily white 
, recent newcomers have been from all over the world. We have a newlywed couple from Togo, a small family from Rwanda, a large family from Kenya, a young family from the Phillipines, and an hispanic family in which some of the members don't understand English very well (or not at all), plus a couple of racially blended families. Hence, it's what is sometimes known as a church, with members having all different skin tones in the "rainbow"... And who speak in all sorts of accents, too. You'll understand why this bit of information is important in a little bit.
So first off, this cantata was a conglomeration of various Christmas music from various genres written in the last couple hundred years, including (but not limited to) "What Child is This?", "O, Little Town of Bethlehem", "Mary's Little Boy Child", "Amen, Amen" (remember that one? Sidney Poitier sang it in "Lilies of the Field" with some nuns), "Some Children See Him", "Mary Did You Know?", "Happy Birthday Jesus", "Sweet Little Jesus Boy" and "Away in a Manger". Some of the music was accompanied by piano, some by organ, and some of it was acccompanied by CD recordings. There were a few solos and speaking parts, as in all cantatas.
The main speaking part was of Mary, reminiscing about the events leading up to the birth of Jesus.
It might surprise you to know that Mary was a black woman from Togo, with an extremely thick French accent. At least that's what Mary was was in our cantata! Seriously though, they needed someone who was fairly young, but old enough to handle reading the extensive lines required. There simply aren't many young women in that church, and among the few there are, she was probably the only one who was able to not only attend rehearsals, but would also definitely be available for this morning's cantata. She did a good job though - despite the fact that it was a bit difficult to understand her at times.
I'm used to certain people in the choir getting all the solos, and the ones who did solos did not disappoint. They're not all excellent singers, so if you're looking for musical perfection, you'll have to look elsewhere. But they have the heart to give it their all,. and that's much more moving than singing something note perfect, with no feeling at all behind it.
But surprise of surprises, this morning, they had a few extra soloists, and they were people who aren't even in the choir normally. For instance, the Sidney Poitier lines in "Amen, Amen" were done by our lovely black woman from Kenya, and her husband did a solo part on a song with the children's choir. Oh and they had two of the children (who were all dressed as angels or shepherds) sing a duet for part of "Happy Birthday Jesus".
So anyhow, I was sitting there enjoying every bit of this (even the occasional missed note - it's endearing that way). One of the really good soloists was in the middle of "Sweet Little Jesus Boy" when suddenly...
... my cell phone rang! 
I'd forgotten to turn it off, or at least switch it to vibrate, and instead had left it on loud. To be fair, I very seldom *ever* get a phone call, and up until very recently, I could never even get a signal on my phone when I was inside the church building, so I'm just not used to having to turn it off before going in for church.
If I'd been sitting in the back of the church where I could have ducked outside unobtrusively, it might not have been so bad. But noooooo... it was crowded there this morning because extended families showed up for the cantata, so I ended up sitting in the very front.
If I had a normal ring tone, it might not have been so bad. But nooooo... a couple weeks ago, I downloaded a new ringtone to my phone because I was having trouble hearing the pre-installed ring tones when my phone was zipped inside my purse.
And the acoustics in that sanctuary are nearly perfect, in that it doesn't matter where you are in there, you can hear everything clearly from nearly everywhere else in the room.
What ringtone interrupted a lovely rendition of "Sweet Little Jesus Boy"? Cantina Band from Star Wars! The only way it could have been worse is if I'd downloaded The Exorcist instead. And trust me, I considered that one, because it's hard to find ring tones that I can hear over typical background noise, but Shorty has that ring tone, and to avoid confusion when she's at home, I needed to find something different, so Cantina Band it was.
I ripped my purse open as soon as I heard it, grabbed the phone and flipped the thing open to quiet it, then closed it immediately, without even finding out who it was. Then I went outside to turn it off, because of course it has this little tune it plays when it's powering down too, and I figured I'd better turn it off before whoever-it-was decided to call me back, then went back inside just in time to hear the last few seconds of that solo.
Just as I was sitting down again, the man who was doing the solo in the next song started doing his solo... Only he wasn't supposed to sing his solo yet! Eventually he realized his mistake, and after a few chuckles from everyone in the place, they started that song over again.
I'm glad it's such a casual church. Just a few minutes before my cell phone went off, a small child started fussing and his brother took him outside to keep from disturbing the cantata further, but it's not the least bit unusual for at least one person each week to have a cell phone or pager ring, or a watch alarm go off, I guess we're just used to occasional interruptions during the service, it's just embarassing when it happens to *you*.
Note to self: Turn off your cell phone before church!
And a Merry Christmas to all!
Discuss this Journal entry [11]
Latest reply: Dec 18, 2006
A Christmas Story
Posted Nov 10, 2006
For those of you who are fans of the movie, a little something to get you in the mood:
http://www.starz.com/features/christmasstory/
Discuss this Journal entry [12]
Latest reply: Nov 10, 2006
Lancaster County Native wins Le Tour de France!
Posted Jul 23, 2006
Floyd Landis is amazing.
It really looked like he couldn't possibly win it, after a "meltdown" in the Alps just a couple days ago, which put him 10 minutes from the lead.
And yet he did it - and did it on a bum hip joint that has been essentially destroyed by an arthritis causing injury from 3 years ago!
I love it when some local boy makes good.
This article is from the local paper this morning, before he had "officially" won - but I like the article, because it tells a lot about him, and his background.
http://local.lancasteronline.com/4/24261
Discuss this Journal entry [4]
Latest reply: Jul 23, 2006
First ttime ever!
Posted Jun 12, 2006
I actually made it all the way through one of these little games!
http://hollywoodrecords.go.com/polyphonicspree/questfortherest/
Discuss this Journal entry [6]
Latest reply: Jun 12, 2006
Lady Scott
Researcher U189338
Write an Entry
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a wholly remarkable book. It has been compiled and recompiled many times and under many different editorships. It contains contributions from countless numbers of travellers and researchers."