Christmas 2025… one for the ages!

Happy Boxing Day, everybody. Bill has gone off to work today, and I’m sitting here tying up loose ends from our Christmas celebration. It was actually a pretty good day for us. The weather was appropriately bitterly cold, so we got to light a fire, which we kept going for most of the day. We got lots of cool stuff, mostly for the kitchen. I got a new banjo, which was a bucket list item for me, ever since I was a child. Bill says there’s more stuff coming; unfortunately, he ordered from a place that is shipping from China. 😬

Our morning started off with Eggs Benedict, excellent Peet’s Big Bang coffee, and orange juice…

Then, after I started our fire going and turned on some Christmas music, we sat down to open the presents. As usual, I bought most of them, so Bill did most of the unwrapping. I got lots of photos of that…

We got some cool Italian designed kitchen and dining gadgets, several new cookbooks featuring cuisine from Turkey, the Baltic countries, and the Caucasus countries, a new coffeemaker and a new blender, tarot cards, glasses and glass drinking straws, and a couple of Jungian books for Bill… I got him two new Alpa sweaters from Finland, and sweater soap, a new pen and Moleskine writing pad, a new bread knife, Chemex carafe, and mixing bowls, bags for the sous vide, food storage containers, and ginger jam… Charlie was there to supervise, while Noyzi stayed in his “room” upstairs.

*This is a really interesting looking book about our favorite chocolatier!*

And then came the most exciting gift of all…

Bill ordered a bluegrass banjo from Ireland. It came from McNeela, the same company that made the bodhran drum Bill got me last year at Christmas. I am very impressed with the quality. It was a lot heavier than I was expecting it to be, which is why Bill is holding it in the photo! I’ve always been fascinated by banjos, and have always wanted to learn how to play one… So we’ll see how it goes. I’m still working on my guitar(s), after all!

*I had to do a little rearranging of my “studio” to accommodate the new banjo. And now I have space for two more instruments!*

Below are a couple more photos of noteworthy Christmas gifts. I was particularly amused by the Eggsecutor, a handy device used to open boiled eggs. I loved the witty description of it on the box! Bill said it was kind of like a guillotine for eggs!

All in all, it was a pleasant holiday celebration for us… and I managed to capture a few moments on video…

My laugh is annoying… sorry! Maybe my mother-in-law will watch this.

And then for dinner, Bill cooked duck legs, roasted potatoes, and green beans, fresh baked bread, Italian red wine, and brownies and ice cream for dessert…

Man… how did I get so lucky? My husband is an absolute KEEPER. He’s a great cook and bartender, and a wonderful lover and friend!

Below is a photo of this morning’s breakfast. Bill made the bread, and “eggsecuted” the egg with our new gadget! At the end of the above video, you can see how it works!

We’ve got one more week to go before this annus horribilus is finally over… But I am grateful that I get to spend this time with my dearest friend and husband, Bill, who always makes me smile and lets me live life in high style. 😘

I hope those of you who have taken the time to read this also had a great holiday! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you all!

art, books, Hessen, holidays, videos

Christmas 2024 is in the books!

I hope everyone who celebrates had a great Christmas yesterday. Bill and I had a lot of fun. I captured some of it in a video, but I also got lots of pictures. Bill is usually not very good at buying presents for me, because he doesn’t know what I want, or what I’ve already bought for myself. But this year, he gave me a great surprise that I genuinely love! The funny thing is, I doubt most people would love it… but because I’m “obnoxious as hell” (according to my mom), I was delighted to receive it!

I usually buy a lot of books for Bill, but this year, I truly went nuts. I bought him a couple of new cookbooks, even though he usually finds recipes online. I always buy him cookbooks, but this year, I got him an Armenian cookbook and a new Nigella Lawson one. He loves Nigella. I got him new tarot cards and a couple of reference books about tarot cards and symbolism. I got him books by Carl Jung’s protege, Marie-Louise von Franz, as well as one by Jung himself. There were some kitchen tools– a new water pitcher, orange peeler, artsy bottle opener, food chopper, a wooden Tile Rummy game set, and a Le Creuset grill platter. I got him two new sweaters from Ireland, a home brewing journal, books about coffee and fermenting foods, and a large lighted magnifying glass to help with close tasks.

Bill got me a new digital camera with a memory card, two geeky t-shirts in colors I like, a new jigsaw puzzle, a light panel to ward off SAD (which I don’t think I have), and he says two more are coming. But the best present was a wooden sculpture he bought from an art dealer in Wiesbaden. I noticed it last year, when we had some picture framing done. I took a photo of it and put it in this blog… then happened to mention it to Bill a couple of months ago. I wished I’d bought it when I saw it.

Bill had some dental work done a few weeks ago, and the office is within walking distance of the art dealer. So he walked there and looked for the sculpture. He didn’t see it, but thought to ask the dealer about it. It turned out they had an exhibition going on, so they had moved a lot of art to the back. Bill described the sculpture and they did, indeed, still have it (not a surprise to me). The dealer brought it out and Bill paid… a lot of euros for it!

It’s definitely strange, provocative, quirky, weird, and potentially offensive… But I LOVE it! I suspect it will make the few people who visit our house stop in their tracks! It’s the kind of thing our uptight former landlady would have hated, and the idea of her sneaking into our house when we weren’t home and seeing this warms the cockles of my heart. Of course, she’s in our past… but I’m sure there will be others like her in the future, right?

Below is a video I made of our gift exchange… It’s not particularly well edited, and I expect only my mother-in-law will watch it.

YouTube says this video isn’t viewable in Russia. So much the better.

I have some photos, as well…

And below are some photos of the food… Bill started us off with baked eggs done in the Instant Pot, grits, fresh orange juice, coffee, and homemade bread. Later, for dinner, we had a savory cheesecake with Gouda cheese, Gruyeres, bacon, and spinach. Also, there was a side salad with balsamic vinaigrette, homemade bread, and local wine poured in new wine glasses gifted to us by Bill’s mom. For dessert, we had cherry cheese pie.

The finished product. Bill used the recipe in The Trellis Cookbook, which was written by the late chef Marcel Desaulniers. He was an owner of The Trellis restaurant in Williamsburg, Virginia. I worked there from 1998-99 for about 18 months. My sister also worked there when it first opened in 1980.

Perhaps my favorite part of the day was during the afternoon. We were listening to Christmas music and a song by Kenny Rogers came on. All of a sudden, I remembered his 1969 hit, “Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love to Town.” That was NOT the song that was playing, of course… but before I knew it, I started coming up with lyrics about Elon Musk. Bill joined in, and before we knew it, we had collaborated on a song parody. I sang the new version, set it to AI generated images and memes, and uploaded it to YouTube.

I suspect there could be more collaborations in the future!

All in all, it was a very nice Christmas 2024… one hundred percent drama free! This is in contrast to Christmas 2004, which was definitely not drama free. But that’s a story better suited to my other blog.

Hope your holidays are grand!

holidays

What Santa brought… (so far)

Merry Christmas to all who celebrate! I thought I’d write a very quick post about our Christmas morning. It’s been kind of funny.

You see, I don’t like seeing the tree with few presents under it. I tend to buy a lot of gifts for Bill, although a lot of them are actually for both of us. He, on the other hand, doesn’t have the time to do a lot of shopping, and he hasn’t really got a clue what to get for me. I tend to buy myself whatever I want when I want it.

He did buy me a new guitar last week, which I love. And he says there are a couple of guitar accessories that are coming when they are no longer backordered. I got a brand new Apple Watch, too… the 9 series, which I understand Apple has just pulled over intellectual property issues. He also had Mary Basmajidian (aka Vartoush Tota) make me a Christmas greeting video. That was a hit. And he bought me a couple of pairs of nice alpaca socks.

He bought me women’s t-shirts with beer demands on them in German– you know, the kind that are really close fitting, with little cap sleeves? I don’t know if or when I’ll be wearing those. They don’t tend to look so good on short, squatty, busty women with massive beer guts. And he got me a v-logger camera stand, which could be useful. However, I already have one, and I haven’t used it yet. I might use it if and when I ever want to film myself singing and playing guitar at the same time.

Meanwhile, I got him a lot of books– three new cookbooks (two Persian cuisine and one that has ancient recipes) and three Jungian psychology books, including a small version of the Red Book. He already has the really big version, but that one is in storage.

I also bought him a book about H.R. Giger’s art, since I know he’s a fan. We visited Giger’s museum in Gruyeres a few years ago. I bought him a Moka Pot, espresso cups, cheese graters/zesters, coffee beans, an electric milk frother, a pastry scraper, new steak knives, six shirts, two pairs of socks, a small Le Creuset baking pan, bags for the sous vide, and a knife sharpener. A new belt is on the way, too. I think that was everything, anyway… I will probably buy him a new bookshelf for his psychology books.

We can use most of the stuff I got for Bill. I look forward to trying some coffee drinks. It’s probably time for us to do a purge, too… We have a set of nice steak knives we bought at Williams-Sonoma back in 2010 or so, but they’re kind of dull. The new ones are made by Wusthof.

Yep… our Christmases tend to be kind of lopsided. I sit there and watch Bill unwrap everything. But he more than makes up for it over the course of the year. I just like to shop, even if I don’t enjoy wrapping presents.

Today, he’s planning to cook a nice dinner. It’s kind of rainy and gross outside, so maybe we’ll have a fire. That’ll probably do it until next year. I also played some of my best Christmas music… I have a huge library of music, and quite a lot of Christmas music is included. But I don’t actually like listening to Christmas music for more than a few hours total every holiday season. Go figure.

I guess I’ll play my new guitar now. I think in spite of the tiny pile of gifts in the photo, Bill wins in the big spender category! I’m glad we got through our fifth Christmas morning in Wiesbaden!

Below are a few photos…

holidays

Christmas victuals…

After we opened our presents and cleaned up all the pretty paper and bows, Bill got to work on making dinner. He had plans to sous vide a couple of Cornish hens stuffed with wild rice and clementine dressing, using the Anova Precision Cooker I got for him a few years ago. Accompanying our hens would be mashed potatoes, peas, and homemade cloverleaf rolls. For dessert, we had the trifle Bill prepared on Friday. Of course, there would also be plenty of wine, music, and canine company.

The sous vide process took about four hours, and involved sealing the chickens in special bags, which Bill found under the tree yesterday, along with a handy stand for the precision cooker when he’s not using it. After four hours at 150 degrees, Bill would put the hens in the oven to broil, so the skin might crisp.

I think I prefer the baking or broiling method of cooking Cornish game hens. But Bill only uses the precision cooker for steaks, most of the time, so he really wanted to try this method. Supposedly, it keeps the meat from getting too dry.

The end result of Bill’s experiment turned out to be basically okay, except I thought my hen was a little underdone. A little more time in the oven quickly fixed that issue, and I’m perfectly well today, so I obviously didn’t get sick from eating underdone chicken. I do think the chicken stayed moist and flavorful, but the glaze Bill used got a little too brown. I guess I’m a purist when it comes to these things. We also enjoyed a couple of nice Italian wines we purchased through Sommelier’s Choice, an Italian purveyor. A representative is in the wine group I run.

I think my favorite part of the meal were the rolls, which were perfect. I’m proud to report that I taught Bill how to make rolls. When we met, he could cook only a few things. Now, he’s become a real chef. Or, at least in our house, he’s a chef. I seem to have retired from cooking. I used to be pretty good at it, back in the day. I also loved the dessert, although I didn’t come close to finishing it! We have leftovers.

We used the good china and silverware, which we probably ought to break out more often. We also lit candles and a fire, which made the living room look cozy. However, curiously, I neglected to wash the tablecloth. It got a good cleaning this morning.

I got Bill a fondue and raclette grill for Christmas. I did hesitate on that, since I don’t eat a lot of cheese. I do like very specific kinds of cheeses– they have to be mild and melted (it’s a texture issue). If you go to Switzerland for raclette, the whole restaurant smells like ass. I do enjoy fondue, though, and would probably love raclette made with cheese that smells less like ass or a barnyard. Maybe we’ll have a chance to try it today.

I bought Bill a fondue cookbook, as well as a really beautiful cookbook with Alpine recipes, featuring Austrian, Swiss, French, and Italian favorites. Actually, I went a bit nuts on cookbooks, just like I always do. There were SIX of them under the tree! I just couldn’t just pick one or two. I buy them, but we don’t use them very often. I just like to have them around. Some of them are genuinely fascinating. For instance, a few years ago, I bought Bill a copy of The Flavor Bible. He loves it, because it offers a scientific look at cooking. Anyway, now we’re going to need another bookshelf.

I would count this year’s Christmas as one of the better ones. Bill got to talk to his daughter on Skype, and he got to see his cute grandchildren… especially his granddaughter, who is apparently quite a ham. And his daughter is expecting another baby in 2022. Bill told me that when he was talking to her, it felt like everything in the world was alright. That’s a wonderful way to feel, especially in these troubled Corona times.

Below are some pictures from our Christmas dinner…