Poe, Restaurant Week and Storage Solution

The19th of January was Edgar Allan Poe's birthday and the first day of Restaurant Week in our town. They don't have anything in common apart from occurring on the same day - which happens to fall at a time of year when there's absolutely nothing else to do that doesn't involve nearly freezing to death, leaving the country or drinking yourself into an early grave. Hmmm, maybe there is a connection to the author after all.   

His Madness and I started out with Peking Duck and Ahi Tuna at the country club. Obviously, it's no longer a members only situation, these days they let anyone in. The food was great but the decor was so preppy it looked like a Ralph Lauren store had exploded. After the three course meal, wine, drinks, and being surrounded by too much plaid, HM and I decided to watch a movie. In honor of Poe's birthday we settled on The Raven, a movie we had been meaning to watch for about a decade. Since our expectations were low we were surprised when it turned out to be not that bad, although watching the gory details after a big meal was not a good idea.

A few days later we found ourselves at a new, hip, pizza place. The food was excellent but having grown up on a farm I can't look at industrial chic and not think about how painfully hot that galvanized roofing would get in the summer. (One of the most dreaded chores was having to nail the roof on the chicken coop back down after storms.) Then there's those metal chairs, they fit in great with the decor but why do they have to be so uncomfortable?   

Meanwhile, back at Chez Madness, Burt and Ivy along with one unhelpful kitty, were finally getting around to taking down the Christmas trees. This year we all agreed not to try to break our record of keeping the decorations up until Valentine's Day.

 

It did not get off to a good start. Spenser, decided he had a better use for the basket. 

Eventually, the reluctant kitty moved elsewhere and The Crew got to work.

Christmas ornaments, not only are they great earrings . . .

. . . but snotty noses, too. Yuck!

Apparently the Crew were trying Spenser's patience. 

Finally, all the ornaments were removed and it was time to pack up the first tree. Since Burt had disappeared, it was up to Ivy and Kibitz to wrestle it into the bag and down to the basement. 

 

Surprise! Burt was hiding in the bag, waiting for the chance to scare everyone.

He just can't help himself.

They weren't really all that frightened and agreed it was a pretty good prank.

 Since Burt was so happy in the storage bag, Ivy and Kibitz thought he might as well stay there. So they added the tree, zipped it shut and shoved it under the stairs in the basement. Then, after all their hard work they decided it was time to relax and maybe enjoy a glass of Amontillado.

They'll let him out, eventually.

Hope everyone had a great weekend and thanks for stopping by!

  

The Holiday Crazies

Normally, Friday the 13th would be the perfect reason to do a spooky blog post, right? Unfortunately, due to experiencing my second slightly disastrous Christmas in a row, my house is currently in full tilt Happy Holiday mode, without one creepy corner (outside of the basement) to photograph the Crew in. Oh, well, there's another one coming - in October, ha!

We're probably not the last people with our decorations still up, at least I hope so. In my defense, it seems like I just got it all done. When your friends and relatives are scattered from coast to coast, Christmas becomes more of a concept than a specific date on the calendar. For our family, it's been a fluid holiday for a long time and since I tend to be a serial procrastinator, that can be both a good and a bad thing. We've never managed to get together prior to the 25th, but usually we celebrate before New Years. Once it even stretched into late January, still all that really matters is that we get to see each other and have a good time. 

This holiday season started out pretty typically . . . for us. During last year's fiasco with my broken ankle and the non-existence of fresh cut trees, we bought an artificial one for our living room. No matter how much I wanted to go back to a real tree, it just didn't make sense. We did get a fresh wreath and garland for the front porch so at least our car got to smell like Christmas.

The rest of the decorating went smoothly and by Christmas most of it was done!

Ivy took the photos for the yearly card and even got them in the mail in time.

Burt and Kibitz were very cooperative and held really still.

There were still cookies to bake, presents to wrap and some complicated ethnic recipes to puzzle out, but the preparations were moving along. 

Then the first virus came down the chimney, followed by a few of its friends. They weren't serious and didn't take too long to get over (the worst parts, anyway) but they just kept coming. At least it did provided an opportunity to get the online shopping done.

Plus Spenser was happy to have someone to keep him company while he watched YouTube.

In the end we coughed and sneezed our way through to the New Year and had a good time, too. Then while driving back from the airport, it dawned on me that I didn't take one single photo! What? Apparently being so focused on what hadn't been done, made me forget about what was really important, duh! The lesson I've finally learned from the last two Christmases is that you never know what's going to happen so it's a good idea to plan for the worst. I think hope for the best, plan for the worst is the actual saying but maybe it should also include, and don't forget to take pictures!

A belated Happy Holidays to everyone who celebrates.

Happy New Year and Happy Friday the 13th, thanks for stopping by!

November Leftovers, The Day before Thanksgiving

There's always a lot to do on the day before any big holiday and Thanksgiving is no exception. Since we weren't entertaining this year, His Madness and I were mostly planning to eat, drink and watch Netflix - until my laptop quit working! How was I going get through the holidays without it? Can you still drive to the mall and buy gifts from a store? It's pretty much the epitome of a first world problem. Scary because you suddenly realize how dependent you are on them and embarrassing because it takes a minute to figure out how to do things without them. So glad it wasn't my phone! 

Apart from the laptop incident, the rest of the holiday prep was easy. Ivy and Burt switched out the mantle decor for a more fairytale look, somehow Thanksgiving really suits the Pumpkin Head people. 

A few grocery store roses spruced up the table.

Thanksgiving dinner wouldn't be complete without some sort of pie, even if we were celebrating by ourselves. His Madness read that most canned pumpkin is actually butternut squash. So he got one from the grocery store to check it out and it did make an excellent pie and tasted just like the pumpkin ones, imho. Looks like one of the turkeys flew into someone's beak.

I have to admit that releasing Wednesday the day before Thanksgiving really kept the spooky season going, for me anyway, ha! While it seemed like everyone else was already thinking about Christmas, the Crew was concocting a their favorite snacks for the big binge. 

Burt was in charge of baking the Brie.

While Ivy sliced up a few things.

They were very careful about the wine selection and found the perfect pairings.

Even their corks were spooky. Though it took me awhile to realized that it's a wine glass on the skull's nose and forehead. 

Finally, everything was ready, and the bingeing could start! After three episodes and one bottle of wine we decided to save the rest for Thanksgiving Day. There was going to be a lot of shopping to do on Friday. Luckily, a certain electronics chain store had the laptop I wanted in stock and it only took a couple hours to restore my files. The new one is great but now I'm worried something bad is going to happen because the whole replacement process was way too easy. 

It's been nearly two weeks since Thanksgiving, but I'm caught up with my blog posts. It's beginning to look a lot like Creepmas here, or maybe it's just time to quit procrastinating and relocate all those collapsing jack-'o-lanterns to the compost bin!

A belated Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate.

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon!

Hammond Castle Museum

Earlier in the month, HM and I went to stay with our son Andy and his wife Kristin. On these trips we usually try to visit someplace we've never been before and this time it was Hammond Castle Museum. It sits on the rocky cliffs overlooking Gloucester Bay and there's great views of the ocean everywhere, even the steps going down to the castle from the parking lot. Here's Andy pretending he isn't worried that we're taking too many photos and not paying attention to where we're walking.  

Constructed in the late 1920's in the style of a medieval castle, it was the home and laboratory of John Hays Hammond, an inventor credited with developing the foundation of all modern radio remote control devices. He also was an avid collector of artifacts from ancient Rome through the Renaissance, and they are on display as well as incorporated into the building. The leaves were definitely well past their peak but that was okay. It was a beautiful day in the mid 70's F. in November, no one was complaining!  

The Great Hall was designed to give the impression of a Gothic cathedral and it was mostly used for concerts. Steps at the opposite end from the massive organ lead up through an actual medieval arch that marks the entrance into the courtyard.  

According to the guide book, the courtyard was designed to represent a 15th century French village outside of a 13th century cathedral that had been built around ancient Roman ruins. Probably without the HVAC systems and glass roof but you've got to admit it's a good story. 

Hammond sourced most of his artifacts by himself in Europe and he bought three 15th century shopfronts prior to building his dream home. These two stores, a butcher on the ground floor with a wine merchants offices above, came from Amiens, France. 

A bakery, originally from Tours, France, is on the right. The 13th century arch surrounding the entrance to the Great Hall (or the cathedral, depending on your point of view) was found in pieces among rubble in Naples, Italy.  

Since medieval villages would have had a communal water supply, it offered the perfect excuse for an indoor swimming pool. Apparently, the 2nd century Roman sarcophagus (which was never used as a coffin) served as the diving board. Along with the columns, it completes the ancient Roman ruins part of the courtyard's story.

A view from one of the guest bedrooms overlooking the courtyard.

Sometimes it was hard to tell what was old from what was really, really old.

Apart from the Great Hall and courtyard, the rooms were large but not cavernous and it was probably a fairly comfortable home.

The Butler's pantry, was almost the same size as the kitchen, which was located below, on the ground floor. Seeing the kitchens preserved in historic homes is always a bonus.   

The Bay of Gloucester was looking a little rough that day but since it was so warm and sunny, it didn't seem too much of a threat. However, after looking at the iron work on the windows, I'm wondering were they made that way to make it look more like a castle or as protection from the storms?

There is some access to the oceanside areas but it is built on a cliff so space is limited. This rock reef is called Norman's Woe and no one seems to know why. Maybe it has something to do with the numerous shipwrecks it's caused due to being underwater at high tide? Longfellow was inspired to write "The Wreck of the Hesperus" by it's reputation. I was forced to memorize that poem in middle school and have tried to forget about ever since. Now I know where it all began.

Andy and Kristin were great hosts, as always. Here they are, still smiling at the end of the tour! If you find yourself in the Boston area, it's a great day trip and definitely a place worth visiting.

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon!

 

Changes

While the rest of us Halloween addicts face another melancholy morning Burt remains as disgustingly cheerful as ever. How can he be so happy now that spooky season is over?

It's not like we don't realize it's time to move on and get ready for the holidays, but does he have to be so enthusiastic about it?

Of course, he never completely forgets about Halloween.

 Ivy has reset the one clock in the house that doesn't automatically reset itself, not that anyone really trusts it to be accurate anyway. Then she rearranged the mantle decor to a somewhat autumnal look and decided the decorating was done for Turkey Day. It's a process.   

So Halloween is over but autumn is still around to enjoy. Mother Nature delivered some pretty spectacular foliage to our corner of the planet this year. It's been a lot warmer than usual too, but the colors were still fabulous and they hung around longer than normal. Last May nearly all of our magnolia's blooms were wiped out by a hard freeze but it took the opportunity to redeem itself and put on a great show this fall.   

Unfortunately, all this beautiful autumn color comes with a price, but it's never been nice enough to rake the leaves in shorts before! We still can't believe it didn't snow on Halloween. 

Just to keep it real, this was the other end of our block when it started snowing on October 17.

Elsewhere in the garden, the lingering warmth brought out a few roses.

The aconite got a chance to bloom, too. It's the last perennial to flower and is very determined to survive in our garden no matter how many times I pull it out. At least it hasn't killed anyone . . .  yet.

Finally, I had to add this just to remind myself that it actually occurred because it hasn't happened before. Usually, we get a hard freeze or storm that knocks the leaves off the trees that change color late in the season. This year the leaves on our two-toned crabapple actually stayed around and turned two colors: orange and yellow! On the side that has fuchsia flowers in the spring and produces small red apples, the leaves turned orange. Then, a week or so later the leaves on the other half, the one that has white blossoms followed by green apples, faded to yellow. This is a bad photo of the tree photobombed by an out of control climbing rose and a dead lilac. The big yellow tree on the right is our neighbor's. The leaves on the white blossom side are still green and the apples, that are usually green have ended up a pinky-orange this year. What a mess and still, how amazing! Worse yet, when are all those apples going to fall and who's going to clean them up?

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon!