off to the hot

We've been getting serious rain all day here in the thirsty valley.  Anyone listening to the radio or watching TV over the past couple of days has heard all about the disaster that's about to befall Northern California and the west coast of Oregon.  Yes, it's wet and windy but as of right now what we've had is a steady downpour, not a deluge.  We, of course, are keeping an eye on the weather map since we  have to be out of the house by 3:45 AM tomorrow morning.  I was quite concerned yesterday, thinking about having to cancel reservations, rebook, etc.  But as of now it all looks like a "go" from here to LA.  It's raining there, too, but not enough to cancel the flight to Mexico.  At least not now.

Moving on from the weather front to the entertainment front, I heard an interview with Alan Cumming conducted by Terry Gross a few days ago.  I am a huge Cumming fan.  He's like Meryl Streep in his gift of linguistic imitation.  His "real" accent is very Scottish, but he does the flat, affect-less accent of the American mid-west just perfectly, as in Eli Gold on The Good Wife.  His German accent in Cabaret is. as it is meant to be, sharp and very guttural and just perfect.  So anyway, in this interview, Terry asked him about this movies and he mentioned The Anniversary Party.  The Flix® had it, I asked for it, I watched it yesterday.  Great cast; Cumming, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kevin Kline, Gwyneth Paltrow to name a few.  Cumming as a younger man (he was 36 in the film) is interesting to watch especially in light of his later work.  It starts as a fairly innocuous story that gradually devolves into utter chaos.  It was fun watching these actors in their younger days.  Written and directed by Cumming and Leigh.

It's adios from the wet and soggy valley.  Tomorrow it will be ¡Hola! from the beach.  I don't know what I've done to deserve such a gift, but I'll take it and not ask too many questions.

lights, camera, not a lot of action

Last night I had a splendid Thai dinner with Erin, then we drove through parts of town looking at the lights displays.  Since we have all been warned about the coming BIG storm I think many people have delayed their decorations.  Or at least that's how I would interpret the appalling lack of same.  But here are a few that were quite bright and cheery.

The owner of this house does a bang-up job of decorating every year.  Erin knows him and told me that he actually makes all of them from odds and ends of parts he finds.  It's quite a show that includes Santa, Snoopy, rockets, reindeer, wreathes, stockings, and much, much more, all of it in lights.

We walk by this house every morning and have been looking forward to seeing it at night.  So here it is in all its electrical glory.  It's a bit hard to see but on the right side of the picture in the back is a big inflatable Santa.  This place also had music playing.

If you stand real still you can almost hear the spinning of the electric meter!

I look forward to this display every year.  It's next door to us on a flag lot and it's a group effort.  The arches span the driveway and at the end is the Abominable Snowman.  So bright and cheery on a dark and stormy night!

I wish I were going to be here next week and could see now things fared in the coming wind and rain!

One more photo from the Thanksgiving trip to Bozeman.  I took this on Friday, looking from Cait's house across the city to the Bridgers.  The sun was setting and the snowy peaks gleamed.  Nice.

another winner from the Flix®

 I got everything on my list taken care of yesterday so I rewarded myself with this movie from instant watch:  Le Week-End starring two of Britain's finest actors (and one of our just OK actors).  Jim Broadbent (Nick) and Lindsay Duncan (Meg) play a married couple who go off to Paris to celebrate (I use that word advisedly) their 30th wedding anniversary.  They run in to an American friend of Nick's, Morgan (played by Jeff Goldblum).  At a dinner party held at Morgan's apartment, the couple comes to an unexpected view of their rather tepid life together.  It is quite a splendid story photographed in the most beautiful city in the world by a cinematographer who obviously loves the place as much as I do.

Today I checked off the list a trip to the city offices to suspend our garbage pick-up; anyone staying here carries out whatever they carried in!  I suspended the Flix® service; since I would see instant watch via a Mexican server movies will all be in Spanish and (a) I just don't want to work that hard and (b) the selection of titles is not very good.

Tonight it's out to dinner with friend Erin and a drive through town to look at the Christmas lights.  I'm hoping people have not decided to take decorations down based on the dire warnings of local weather forecasters.  We're due a huge storm starting sometime tomorrow, lasting through Thursday and into early Friday.  Not good news for us travelers.

don't miss this (ahem!) gem

I watched this delightful movie yesterday and give it two thumbs up for sure.  It's on instant watch thanks to the Flix®.

 

It's the true story of four Aboriginal girls who form a singing group and are a huge success, despite all the hurdles thrown in front of them.  These actresses have astonishing voices, too.  Only one tissue needed.

Today's "to do" list; go to the bank, pick up a couple of beach dresses I had made, pedicure, manicure, go to Davis Waste Removal to get put on the basic rate with no pick-up for the next few months, buy a couple of pairs of rubber gloves here because the ones I buy there are so flimsy they rip and tear and leak after a week of use.  If I can get all that done today I'll be right on schedule.

getting ready

While the lively strains of Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" fill the house ~ first opera of the 2014-15 radio season, live from New York ~ I am starting to pack up for the fun-in-the-sun in Mexico.  Let's see; among my T-shirts and shorts is a 1-lb. box of MSG for Jack (for his kim-chee); four strands of twinkle lights; a pkg. of dried porcini mushrooms; 7 vials of insulin; and perhaps one more jar of peanut butter.  The TSA has a field day with our luggage!  We leave next Friday and although I am very much looking forward to it, there's much to be done before we turn the key in the lock.  But first, a backward look at Thanksgiving.  Let me say that a fine time was had by all, people and animals alike.  The snow was so beautiful to see.  Being a Southern Californian, born and raised, I still get all excited at this weather phenom, although I can certainly see that months on end of grey skies and dirty slush would get boring.  But at first sight, it's dazzling.

before the snow storm hit

during the storm

and after

The feast was overwhelming, as usual.  The Hutterite turkey did not disappoint.

The hostess set a beautiful table, with flowers and candles and a view out of the new window of the snowy meadow.   Picture perfect.

And of course, one of the boys.

Huck (l) and Zeke (r).  Actually taken while Cait and Mike were on a camping trip to Canada but I love it and thought you should see it.

Now it's on to getting out of here and into the warm, tropical winter instead of the cold, snowy one.  We will be picked up by the shuttle at, gasp!, 3:45 on Friday morning for a 6 AM flight to LAX.  Then a 10:30 flight to Manzanillo.  Fernando will pick us up and Chuy will have prepared our dinner ~ chiles rellenos.  Let the season begin.

While in Bozeman g'son Andrew helped me program a web site to advertise the sale of the house.  As soon as I finish a bit more editing I will put it up and you can peruse it at your leisure.  We are getting serious about this sale!

Meanwhile, here in the valley we have had several days of wonderful rain to slake the overwhelming thirst of field and stream.  And there's more to come later in the week.  But after I get my pedicure (Monday), massage (Tuesday), and hair cut (Thursday), I'm outta here in into the warm so let it rain.

FYI:  If you read the previous post and the video was not there, it's there now, at the top of the page.  

no catch-up

There's absolutely no way in the world I'm going to try to play "blog catch-up" here.  I'm just going to start in today and keep moving forward.  If I remember something important I'll add it later.

We are in Bozeman, MT for our annual Thanksgiving thanksgiving.  Other guests will be Andrew, already here, Alex (arriving tonight) and Mike's mother and brother.  There is going to be at least one additional dinner guest on Thursday, maybe two.

  This was the first glimpse of snow in Salt Lake City, seen from our arriving flight.  Three hours in the airport, the boredom broken by running in to these two passengers who were also awaiting the Bozeman flight.

They were very well-behaved little ladies, each with a little carry-on canvas bag into which they very willingly wriggled at flight time.

Despite weather predictions to the contrary, there was very little snow when we got here (although it's snowing like mad right now).  Mike and Cait were at the airport to meet us.  We picked up the car, followed them to our apartment, unloaded and headed out to Ted's for bison meatloaf (Mr. C) and bison short ribs for me.  I didn't sleep very well; couldn't seem to get my brain to slow down.

Monday we drove over to C & M's house, admired the gorgeous new window they installed in the living room to take advantage of the fabulous view of their meadow and the mountains beyond.

There was an old (fake) stone gas fireplace that didn't add to the ambiance and obscured the view.  Much prettier now.  We made long shopping lists and took care of all that commercial business in a couple of hours.  First stop was, of course, to buy the turkey from the Hutterite community.  We settled on a big 26-pounder that should yield enough for turkey enchiladas or at least some fat turkey sandwiches.  Back home to unload our haul, then soup for lunch and the afternoon.  But we decided to some back to the apartment befoke darj, have an early dinner and try for better sleep.  It worked!

Back to Cait's this morning to greet Andrew who arrived about midnight last night.  We've been awaiting a big snow storm and it has finally arrived with a flourish.  Check out this little video.

(Well, I can't seem to get the video to load so I'll wait and put it up when I can get help from  Andrew tomorrow.)  OK, he showed me how to do it but it's at the top of the page instead of here!


Here's the back deck with it's lovely dusting of fresh snow.

We've started our great feast preparations.  Mr. C has made a cranberry chutney with jalapeños and has gathered together the ingredients for two cherry-apple pies.  I will make a lemon chiffon pie tomorrow, then prep the brussel sprouts and carrots.  Cait starts her dressing (Andrew will be her prep chef), Mike makes cornbread (for the dressing).  I've already done the flowers so that's taken care of.  I think we're actually going to be ready and hey, if not, we'll all be together, ready or not!

Back to the apartment to avoid (a) getting stuck in C & M's driveway and (b) having to drive through falling snow in the dark on what will probably become icy roads.  We'll save that for tomorrow.  Meanwhile, Alex arrives about 7 PM and she'll come directly here for dinner with us.  Her room is ready and waiting.  Tomorrow morning we'll all head back to Bristol Lane (C & M's) for another round of cooking and talking while we await the arrival of Mike's family in the early evening.

our Thanksgiving destination

Really?  Seriously?  Yes, really and very seriously.