$5 AmazonOn Demand Credit

...Can be used for renting online movies. And wouldn't you like a new movie to watch during that fast-moving-in stormy winter night!

    You'll need a Twitter account, but it only takes a minute after that. Go here. (Many thanks for the tip, One Frugal Girl.)

Track Santa The Easy Way

NORAD normally tracks drug dealers and such. But one night a year, it focuses on the other major intruder in airspace: Santa. Track him and the reindeer here -- has he found your home yet?

My Very Best Wishes for...

A happy and peaceful Christmas, with time to enjoy and reflect. 

I'm so grateful for a Savior born on earth for us!

Spontaneous Meeting Combustion...

'Flashmobs' have been one of the newest developments -- a whole bunch of people who get together in a preplanned place and DO SOMETHING.

Like the Hallelujah Chorus...

Or rocking out to Christmas music!


(Many thanks to friend Marcie for passing this on.)

The Sweet Smell of...

Are you partial to how things smell?
    When I was little, I realized that people (and their homes) had a distinctive scent. I could even tell, head down, when a certain aunt, or my grandma, entered the room, based on the smell that preceded them. (My grandma smelled like hermit spice cookies!)
     Even now, I tend to rely on how things smell -- I rarely turn on a timer when cookies are baking, for example. Instead, I wait until they have a 'just-baked-but-not-burning' waft. Rice smells a little like mothballs when it's done. And brownies don't start scenting the air until 'just' before they're finished.
     Husband thinks this is funny, but generally is ok with it. The one bad part -- if you get involved somewhere else in the house, and forget to check! (A glance at the clock now and then helps.)
     This blogger got me started on the power of smell. The interesting part about this -- you can actually BUY smells like 'baby powder' and 'bonfire,' thanks to Demeter Fragrances. (They've got stuff on sale, plus shipping discounts.)


    My top ten favorites: lavender, soap (especially Dial), cinnamon, coffee, bacon, lilacs in spring (or the scent of freshly-dug earth), freshly-ironed linen (or sheets off the clothesline), tangerines, cedar...and the scent of Husband and Daughters when I snuggle into their arms.
    What are yours?

Seven Fish Dishes for Christmas

I just found Grocery Cart Challenge's list of 101 stocking stuffers...more good ideas here! One is beloved by Daughters, who are always visitiing the laundromat -- a roll of quarters.
    Also, Jenn at Frugal Upstate, bless her heart, has 68 ideas for stuffing guys' stockings -- Hooray! Husband tends to be quiet to start with, and is not exactly forthcoming about what he'd like in this department. (I can't get the ATV-for-hunting he'd really like, to fit in the sock.)


* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

    A reader asked about the Seven Fish Dishes. Having seven fish dishes (or nine, or as many as thirteen, according to this Wikipedia entry, "The Feast of the Seven Fishes") is an old Italian-American custom for Christmas Eve. The fish (a popular way to stay 'meatless') represent the seven sacraments of the Catholic church.

     I can hear your next question -- are we Italian? Naahh...though we LOVE their food, and Husband spent some time in Naples, Rome and elsewhere during his Navy years. (P.S. We don't go to a Catholic church, either.)
     When the girlies were little, and I was often housebound with them, I started trying to celebrate a different country's customs every year at Christmas time. The Italian version -- the seven fish dishes -- was such a hit that I've repeated it every year, and it has now become a Brick tradition.
     The dishes change, depending on available seafood, what I can find on sale...and our budget. Certain elements remain, though; we always have at least one soup, one whole baked fish, some kind of shrimp. And ALWAYS Angels on Horseback. (The girlies inhale any leftovers while we're washing dishes afterward.) Here's this year's menu:

1.  Clam Chowder (New England style with cream, onion and potatoes -- no tomatoes for us)
2.  Angels on Horseback (oysters wrapped with bacon, skewered with toothpicks, and baked about 20 min. at 400 degrees until crunchy. YUM. Don't knock these until you've tried them!)
Devils on Horseback (chicken livers wrapped with bacon, ditto. I know -- these aren't seafood, but they're a nice complement to the Angels. Don't count them.)
3.  Salmon Creole (salmon filets with a spicy coating)
4.  Shrimp Ajillo (the garlicky Panamanian version of Shrimp Scampi)
5.  Crab Legs 
6.  Tuna with Homemade Noodles (I'll give the recipe for this later)
7.  Rocky Mountain Trout (Daughter #2's contribution; she caught them herself. Baked with mushroom stuffing.)



Plus some kind of greenery in the vegetable department, hot rolls or biscuits and a refresher course of sorbet or sherbet. (All that seafood taste really adds up.) Friend Constance is bringing dessert, and I'll add a platter of chocolates and cookies for after-meal nibbling.
    We dress up in our best...and take our time, with a glass of wine and much talk. Each dish is counted as it appears, and small amounts are the rule, for obvious reasons. Little sighs of pleasure appear for someone's favorite, or a groan from the person who partook too much of another specialty.
      It's a wonderful time.

Christmas Baking

Hmmm...shouldn't I be whipping up sugar cookies or something?
    Maybe take a page from the Swedish Chef, and do up some popcorn shrimp...or doughnuts.

We always have seven fish dishes on Christmas Eve -- have been working up that list. And starting to plan for Christmas dinner, as well.
   Or maybe I should go haul the boxes of decorations up from the basement.


Maybe I'm starting to get into the Christmas spirit.

Serve a Log for Christmas Dinner

...a creamy chocolate log, that is! If you've ever made a jelly roll, a Christmas Log won't be that hard for you. It's a French tradition that Julia Child made especially popular, with the 'log' decorated in meringue mushrooms and clouded with a 'veil' of caramel. (Yum -- just writing about this is arguing for setting aside our more usual Sachertorte, and whipping up this instead!)
      Here's the recipe:

• 1/3 cup cake flour
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/3 teaspoon salt
• 4 large eggs, separated
• 1/4 tsp cream of tarter
• 1 cup granulated sugar, divided
• Confectioners sugar
• Filling:
• 14.5 oz can pitted cherries
• 2 cups whipped topping
• 2 tbsp powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup coffee flavored liqueur

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 15 X 10 jelly roll pan with parchment paper. Grease and flour paper then tap off excess.
     In a medium bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, cornstarch, baking soda, baking powder and salt, then mix well. In a separate bowl, using an electric mixer, beat egg yolks and 1/2 cup sugar until fluffy. In a separate bowl, using clean beaters, beat egg whites on high until foamy. Gradually add 1/2 cup sugar and cream of tarter, beating until stiff, but not dry, peaks form. Fold 1/3 of beaten egg whites into egg yolk mixture. Alternate folding in egg whites and flour mixture.
     Pour batter in pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 15 minutes. Sprinkle a clean towel with powered sugar. Immediately loosen cake from edges of pan and turn upside down onto towel, sprinkled with powdered sugar. Carefully remove paper. Trim off stiff edges of cake, if necessary. While hot, carefully roll cake and towel from narrow end. Cool on wire rack at least 30 minutes.
     Combine cherries, powered sugar and liqueur is a small bowl. Let stand at least 5 minutes then drain liquid and spoon over cooled cake. Add whipped topping to cherries. Spread cherry mixture over center of cake and roll cake into a log. Refrigerate for 1 hour or more, even overnight. Garnish with whipped topping or chocolate syrup.
    (Thanks to MDWanda at Better Recipes.com for sharing this)

More Christmas cakes are at Better Recipes.com ...take a look!

Christmas Repurposed

Simple, graceful ideas for gift wrapping...


New things you can do with holiday items...

all sorts of Christmas crafts to start now...and finish!

Maybe it's a response to all that cynical humor of Scrooged (yes, I watched it on AMC recently), but I feel determined to actually enjoy preparing for Christmas this year -- even if it means I put a wreath on the door, make just one or two kinds of cookies...and call it good.
    Not having to kill myself preparing for the festivities would truly make it a Merry Christmas!

Coffee in Boquete

Elizabeth Edwards, estranged wife of one-time political candidate John Edwards, died yesterday of the cancer she has fought for years. She did it, to the end, with her usual grace and dignity. What a woman...her children can be proud they're hers.
* * * * * * * * *
We're now snug up in the Panama highlands, at the Panamonte Inn, a country inn with a bit of a snooty viewpoint. Poquete ("po-quet-tay"), the town we're staying in, is tucked into a very tree-and-greenery valley that is part of an old volcano. Everywhere you look, it's crammed with green...oh yes, and people. People wandering around the streets -- and stepping out whenever they feel like it, whether a car's coming or not. People drinking beer outside the liquor store -- or older Americans having loud discussions about weird health problems. (I now know more about when you use socks on disgusting feet problems than I ever cared to.) This place is JAMMED with people, bumping into each other, or just wandering the streets. Reminds me, in some ways, of Aspen, with its pile of houses bumping into each other -- especially big houses.
   There are some intriguing people...Indians here to pick coffee, we're told. The women are very short -- less than 5 ft tall, I'd guess -- and wear bright-colored ankle-length dresses that remind me some of Hawaiian muumuus...but in solids, with what looks like rickrack for trim. (The best photo I could find of them is here...we took a few, but were trying not to rubberneck.) They live four hours or more drive away, but take the bus here and stay for some months, picking coffee. I tried sooo hard not to stare, but was intrigued...
    It's been far chillier here than anywhere else in Panama. Last night, we came into town at the start of a rain-and-windstorm. Lots of mist today, with rain off and on. We spent the afternoon on a coffee tour to the La Miligrosa plantation, hosted by "Mr. Tito." (You can find out more about him and his work here.) The guide went through the whole process, from coffee bush/tree to picking, fermenting, drying and roasting the beans.
    They not only roasted some in front of us, but encouraged us to taste them, both the bean and the ground version, made into coffee. (Tasting it in solution is called "cupping.") Before this, I would have sworn that the dark roast was the most flavorful...but according to Mr. Tito and company, dark roasting is generally what's done with a lesser-quality bean, to mask its lesser flavor. (They also say that the 'export brand' is generally the lesser-quality beans; the good stuff is sold in bulk to a buyer -- often Japanese -- or kept in the country!) What I discovered was that the light was good, but the medium roast really brought out the bean's flavor. And the dark roast? You could just taste 'burn,' not the various nuances. ("Smell the citrus?" the guide said, when we sniffed the light roast. And we could. Fruit trees are grown around the coffee bushes, to protect them and give animals another food source. Some believe that these trees actually lend their essences to the coffee, as well.)
    Mr. Tito (full name: Tito Vargas) built his coffee plantation up from some acres of replanted cow pasture. He grew 9 kinds of coffee beans, and processed them with machinery he cobbled together from junk autos -- even a computer fan! And this iconoclast began to win prizes for his coffee. This year, he took second place in the annual Best of Panama coffee contest -- against very heavy competition. (You'll find it listed as 'Panacoffee.') An amazing guy -- and terrific-tasting coffee.

An Irish Look at the Twelve Days of Christmas

Here it is...and don't be forgettin' I'm Irish, too!

Save Bucks on Your Heating This Winter

Get Rich Slowly, a font of wisdom on all things financial (and practical), has a great post on lowering heating costs this season. 
      Clever Dude also has some good ideas; many are similar to GRS, but there's some new stuff here, too.

      At a time when saving extra money really comes in handy, this subject can be of enormous help.
      We keep our bills below $100 -- even in the deepest winter months! -- by following a few basics:
                  *Heaters are turned off in rooms that don't get regular use
                  *The thermostat is kept at 66 degrees (62 degrees at night)
                  *A space heater and fireplace keep things comfortable in the space we spend the most time in --
                          the living room

      Also, we keep a towel or blanket tightly rolled against the front door. (You can literally feel the cold by standing in front of it. I only wish we could do that with the kitchen cupboards, which are against the north wall. The cold is evident when you open a door, and the dishes stay permanently chilled.)
      Next on the list: thick, heavy curtains against the door that leads out to the deck. I'm thinking maybe red corduroy or velvet; Sylvia Plath sewed curtains like that for her living room, and said seeing them drawn was like being inside a valentine. Warmth and beauty -- a nice combination.

Charley Le Chien

A back post, while I'm still in Panama...

    You may have been wondering how Charley, our new ball 'o fire, is doing.

According to him...or us?

Actually, on most counts, he's been wonderful -- friendly and loving. He loves to doze off snuggled against Husband's chair, paw outstretched against his leg in a sort-of "hey, how's it rolling" gesture.

     Buck, our Weimie boss-in-residence, tolerates and even occasionally welcomes his presence. (Especially when it's cold.) For his part, Charley waits to let Buck go first, and obviously enjoys his company on jaunts outside.

    I'm writing all this to remind myself that, by and large, Charley's been a wonderful dog. It's a help, considering he just pulled a whole batch of freshly-watched clothes off the line, and gleefully trampled all over them.
   "HEY, MOM!!! Thanks for the new toys...and they smell like you and Dad!"
    I'll give him a chance to mend his ways. After, that is, I clean up the bits of paper, plus the latest mangled pen, from his chewing episode this morning. He especially loves pens.
    Sigh.

 Charley in front, ready for mayhem -- and Buck, zonked out, snoozing in back