I got a notice from FedEx: my four pound package (what four pound package?) was on its way from Massachusetts (why and who on earth?), sent by…

Blink.

At, and then the name of the company, Consolidated Affiliated Amalgamated Multi-Brand-iated and oh yeah we bought out that company too since you ordered from them. Didn’t recognize the corporate name either. I have no clue.

But the human name up top, that was my aunt’s name and she lived in Massachusetts for years. There are not a whole lot of Rosemarys around, much less one with her last name to go with it. (Okay, I just checked at howmanyofme.com and there are fifty-two in this country. Who knew.)

But notice I put my mom’s older sister in the past tense. Man, that concussion seemed even more spacey-making for a minute there.

A friend of ours stopped by after a trip to Trader Joe’s. He couldn’t fix the concussion–but chocolate, that he could do, so he showed up at our door with a bar of 85% Valrhona for Richard and their 71% for me, pretty sure he remembered our favorites.That he did. And of course it’s his presence and his caring that made our day.

I was glad that he looked out for Richard, too, offering the unspoken understanding that it’s hard to be the one doing the looking after.

Writing and reading are okay, but somehow reading out loud, the words come out stumbley, still. So strange.

Chocolate makes a fine antidote as far as I’m concerned.

I will forever be grateful to the doctor who told me as I was starting to recover from a major Crohn’s flare, “Progress is nonlinear,” and not to let it worry me. Today was a day for remembering and being comforted by that.

I was supposed to pick friends from church up from the airport tomorrow while Richard goes into work. With his having had vacation days last week, my brain…cleared enough to put fact A with fact B and realize that, oh wait, that doesn’t work, he won’t be here. Sending out an email to the ward chat, I had five different people instantly offer to run get them for me. Good people. Good friends. So lucky.

It was already thirty-five degrees out there and Richard needed to do a Trader Joe’s run, with me not up to it yet (but a whole lot better than yesterday) and at that shivery, he went looking for the fleece liner to his jacket that he only adds in a few days a year.

He found that the connector snap on one sleeve had come off at some unknown point, though, and so he came and showed me what to me was a random bit of fabric with an open snap on it. Usually it’s greek-to-me electronic parts in his hands but this was fabric, but it didn’t correspond to anything in any clothing of mine. I figured out fast that it was meant to connect the liner and I was wondering where, though, but when he saw me doing a head tilt, he started trying to describe why it was needed…he helpfully demonstrated the one sleeve in the other (and comically far out the wrist end so I wouldn’t miss it.) He explained that it’s hard to keep the inner sleeve from bunching up on your arm with the friction against the inside of the outer sleeve without its being tethered in place first with those snaps. He went on at some length.

While I tried harder and harder not to burst out laughing and then quite failed. With two layers of sweaters on, myself, because hey, it’s cold, I demonstrated pinching the cuff at the inner wrist with my fingertips for precisely that reason. Pinch to grab, insert. No bunching. (And also why 3/4 length sleeves going into long sleeves are such a hassle.)

This was entirely a novelty to my non-sweater-wearing, always-warm husband, and I guffawed: You’re (mumble mumble) years old and you’ve never learned to do that?!! Or that you need to??

He gave me this goofy grin back. Nope!

I really knew I needed to be seen when I was surprised to see the ileostomy bag. Forgot about that.

Richard drove.

The doctor: Nauseous?

Yes.

Did you eat anything today? What?

A slice of Kringle, a little leftover chicken (I know, the day after Thanksgiving!) and…and… (struggling) …a persimmon.

I was definitely loopy. She had more questions.

Okay, touch my finger, then your nose, then my (moved) finger.

(Wait, my nose is over where?) Right side passed, left side, out to lunch.

Okay, said the doctor, let me see if there are enough people on today down in CT, otherwise you’ll have to go to the ER. Then come right back up here.

A thank you thank you thank you to the people who worked in that department today. They were able to get me in in five minutes. No bleeding but definitely a concussion. My balance is worse than usual and I was told to let my brain rest and heal before doing anything that might risk a second concussion in a short time, especially given my history. Listen to my body: if it doesn’t want to do it don’t do it or it will take far longer to heal.

I had to miss seeing Mel and Kris at a show and that was really hard, but there was just no way. Phyllis had to go off without me.

Feet up. Rest. Knit. Something simple for now.

Aunt Mary Lynn is thankful for the leftover spiced pecans that Richard made.

Her daughter-in-law is thankful for the leftover spiced pecans that I made. (I’m not the only one who likes them that way.)

We’re thankful that everybody had such a great time at our tables of sixteen.

And… having forgotten to set a tap dripping last night, I’m thankful we didn’t have to call a plumber away from his family on Thanksgiving and that we only had to wait an hour to have the pipes thaw so that we could take showers before going to said celebration.

It was already 32F again when we got home. The mango (which we left covered) is at a happy 51F and the kitchen tap got set to dripping in time.

Me, I’m crossing my fingers: I was getting the first of the leftovers that were sent home with us out of the back of the car and didn’t see in the dark that the lift gate hadn’t lifted all the way and hit my head hard. Someone in my inbox wanted me to decipher an easy knitting pattern for them and I told her I’m afraid it’s going to have to wait till morning. I wasn’t knocked out–I have been four other times in my life that I can think of right now–but I instantly just wanted to go to bed.

Yeah, yeah, I’ll be fine. My brain can still write. It just hits my worry spot is all.

Last night I made the spiced pecans and baked the chocolate tortes and bought the apple cider and was glad my part in Thanksgiving dinner was done.  All but the glaze on the tortes, no biggy.

Only, I hard-crack-staged the sugar syrup and those pecans were right at the edge of too caramelized. Crunchy, though, and I really liked them, but there was a bit of fussing while someone here was trying not to be unhappy but they just weren’t quite…

No problem, I can make more.

No I couldn’t. We didn’t have enough sugar. We always have sugar. (Can you make this with that grainy organic Trader Joe’s stuff? Better not experiment and mess any more with his family’s tradition.) You know what this means, don’t you? We had to go to the grocery store the day before Thanksgiving.

I toasted more pecans, but that was the easy part. We put it off and put it off and finally headed to Costco about an hour before they closed.

It was actually less crowded than a typical Saturday, to my great surprise–but even better, people were being mellow. Clearly anticipating the next day’s meal and company, and people seemed to be picking up that one last thing they’d forgotten.

There was one mom with a crying one year old and a toddler and she–the mom–absolutely melted when I pulled out a Peruvian finger puppet for each of her little ones, an orange lion with a furry mane and a vivid green octopus with a hat. Handknit as always.

So. The tortes got glazed. The pecan coating got done to the soft ball stage only, the way Richard likes it: because after I got the 1/2 c water/1 c sugar/1 tsp cinnamon boiling, there could be gadgetry involved and there is no better way to get a geek to take over than putting electronics into the process. He put a glass thermometer on the side and with the laser thermometer in his hand pointing constantly at the center of the pot he compared temps and kept up a happy running chatter and soon announced, There! It’s 238!

Already?

Okay, so I put in the vanilla (one teaspoon) and stood back as hot steam burst forth, and then–hey, you have to put in the *pecans immediately now, honey, not just admire them.

Right, right, and he dumped them in and stirred hard and it takes some doing at that point. Finally, he poured them onto the cookie sheet the pecans had been toasted on.

See? To softball stage and it comes out like this!

I grinned. He preferred his and I liked mine and Aunt Mary Lynn will be quite happy to have both. Trust me.

(Meantime, it’s 9:50 pm and 33F already and the mandarins are covered, too, tonight. It is COLD out there.)

*Fanny Farmer says two cups. I put in closer to four. Stretch that sweetness across as many nuts as possible as far as I’m concerned.

You’re going to need a second strand these next few nights, said he over Monday’s dinner.

I had gotten home 9:45 Friday night, the tree was uncovered till then, and some of the upper leaves crisped a bit.  If I’d known things were going to take that long I’d have done it before I left, but too late now. And now we had the coldest weather of the year coming–he was right, and so I wound a second strand around the mango leaves, watched them light up as I plugged them in and wondered how long my supply of bulbs was going to last. I’d already had about eight burn out last year.

Some friends called this afternoon: could they drop by with some Christmas lights? The warm, inefficient, not made anymore kind. For my tree–did it need it?

Yes please!

They showed up with buckets and boxes and more boxes on top of that, taking three trips to carry them all in, with them happy to find a good use for them and me happy to have them. Some hadn’t even been opened. Yay!

And so we chatted a bit. They asked about the birdfeeder and I mentioned the resident hawk.

Who put on a show right on cue, flying overhead. Twice. But the best part was how excited they were that they got to see it.

It’s cold out there.

She mentioned she hopes she gets to taste one of those mangoes someday. Absolutely.

It’s quite warm tonight under those frost covers.

Knit my way past a roadblock in the pattern again after spending way too long looking at three different potential versions on the screen of where to go from here. Just. Go. Do. It. You can always rip back–one of the great gifts of knitting: there are no permanent mistakes unless you let them be.

I love how it’s coming out.

Meantime, one little boy at the end of the day Saturday who needed to show off his Halloween costume. You can be a super SUPER Ninja if you’re up high on your daddy’s shoulders.

A tired super super Ninja. Hudson had had a very energetic, busy day.

1. The house was freezing. Two sweaters and wool knee socks and a space heater just weren’t doing it for me.

2. Electric power is free, gas is not.

3. The furnace is gas.

4. The oven is electric.

So whaddya think I was gonna do?

And that’s why a cherry almond cake just came out of the oven, the Fannie Farmer almond cake recipe made with Milk Pail‘s fresh almond paste and an added ~half teaspoon of almond extract, pour over a layer of tart cherries in a springform pan and bake. Done.

And then have to deal with the hubby who doesn’t want to wait for it to cool–come to think of it, neither do I.

We explored the very old building where the Mormon Battalion landed in San Diego in the mid-1800s, having been commissioned to build roads and defend the territory for the US against a Mexican army they never saw. Fort Sutter happened while they were in California and some stayed while the rest went home to their families in Utah.

The boys pumped water and panned for gold. Maddie cheered.

Love. As Carole King sang about it, it’s the only thing that’s real.

More tomorrow: after an early flight, playing all day at toddler speed and flying home, we’re both kind of done in for the day.

Dropped Richard off went to the clinic went to pick up my new glasses prescription went to the approved pharmacy across town went to the bank got a receipt for that check and the small Martingale royalty check eight years after publishing was fun too went home hugged daughter dropping by for a moment called the audiologist got told oh oops our bad come back and we’ll fix that for you put the laundry in the dryer grabbed a bite of lunch drove to Los Gatos got the filter put back on the hearing aid that they forgot while cleaning them yesterday went to the bird center as long as I was there anyway got birdseed had them put it in the car left birdseed in the car for the weight and the recent mild back injury tried new glasses on went oh wow how far away is the floor put new glasses back in new case put old glasses on have to drive you know wished again I could settle on what to start for my next carry-around knitting project started more laundry grabbed Time magazine disappointing knitters worldwide picked up Richard from work read while waiting put laundry in dryer made dinner covered mango tree did dishes vegged out at the computer a bit

and oh right I’d better go make that bed now that the sheets are fresh. Extra covers for the mango and us at 38F already out there. Brrr. Done. G’night.

Rain blessed rain, we were doing it Camelot style again: mostly in the middle of the night. It stopped, the sun broke through here and there as we got up and started the day, and then it started in again.

At one point the thunder and lightning were nearly simultaneous as we heard that huge BOOM. Richard was working from home rather than out driving in that and we held our breaths a moment.

The power held.

It came to .54″ here at the eye of the storm.

I was finding and getting rid of kinks from a pattern and feeling productive.

Finally, the sun was out but going down fast–and the Christmas lights weren’t coming on. Huh. It’s getting cold, they sure should be by now. I checked everything, and then with Richard searching for ideas I did again. Breakers were all good. Everything’s plugged in and set. Had a squirrel chewed through the cord under the tomato bush?

Did you check the box?

Of oh course! And so it was, his Rube Goldberg of a thermostat was somehow dead, why, we have no idea. So I bypassed it and simply plugged the lights directly into the orange cord and ta daah!

And… The Acurite was blinking. We changed the batteries and I cleaned off the mud outside and the surprising little bit that had somehow gotten inside, but the temperature sensor part, which I use to read the temp under the mango cover without having to go outside, was still dead.

Two sets of electronics knocked out by the rain. The sensor is designed to be outdoors but the instructions say not to leave it where it will get wet. Um. It’s never been a problem before.

It wasn’t going to do me any good inside, though, certainly, so since the station part wasn’t blinking anymore I might as well try. I stuck it back under the mango cover.

It came back to life! Within an hour, but not in the first five minutes, I know that. Maybe it had just needed to dry out? It’s clearly working fine now.

Maybe I should explain that the rain reader is a third gizmo around here… Who knew we would turn into such weather nerds?

(Oh and? Last week’s falls didn’t improve my balance and I fell out there again. Twice. Always did like splashing in mud puddles as a kid but somehow I missed those, just the cushy bushes.)

It was the annual dessert auction fund raiser for the Scouts.

You know Dave is really good at this when I’m not the only laughing and going, wait, what did he say? as he rattles off in hyperspeak.

He noted that it was our first such night without Shirley and that she had always bid on every dessert, at least something, making everyone’s effort appreciated; and here we had (he presented it) someone had baked one of her favorite recipes in her memory and honor tonight.

Meantime, Donna was livestreaming the proceedings for another elderly member of our ward who in her 90’s had recently moved out of state to be with her children. She hadn’t wanted to miss out. Well, hey, they could do something about that, even if we couldn’t bring her dessert.

Richard and I had both been cornered by various people as we’d come in: You DID bring your chocolate torte, right?

Two! (Recipe here.)

They were waiting, Dave knew it, and he saved them to almost last.

T. had told me in no uncertain terms that one of those was going to be his, but his hand faltered and dropped at $150.

Meantime, others were making plans, and two families in cahoots nailed the second one. One of them proudly presented to me afterwards their toddler’s face completely smeared in ganache–she’d had a good time with her slice. (I didn’t think fast enough to go, Hey, Donna, Nettie would love this!)

$295 for the two of them. The mind boggles and it makes no sense to me, although, fundraiser, okay. And I should stop bragging. I know.  Still, a new record, that’s for sure.