Quite the day. Over 2 feet of snow. Did a little shoveling out the driveway tonight so we could move our cars, for the plow guy to give us a huge help tonight. However today we did do a lot of cooking and baking, A whole chicken in the Instant Pot and then Chicken Soup, a bunch of baked goods like banana bread and peanut butter oats. Big cooking day here. I spent a good part of the day preparing all the ingredients and LD did most of the actual baking. 🙂
LD made a killer baked ziti last night which we’re still eating today. The interesting thing about this is the various ingredients we used. Sure, the regular like broccoli, carrots, onion and garlic, but also the ziti was made out of chickpeas (and although you can taste the difference, it isn’t much and doesn’t detract from the taste) and a bunch of sauces and cheeses.
Spent some time at the sanctuary today and had saw some special guests for a few minutes tonight!
I awoke to a strange sight outside the house as I was getting ready to get in my car to go to work. There was a rather large package waiting in the driveway which for a second thought might be ours but upon further inspection was not, It appears to be some kind of water filtration device after googling the company name listed on the box and appears to be quite expensive. Anyway the address is nowhere close to ours (the number and street are nothing alike) and upon further investigation I believe it may possibly belong to someone either in another part of town or a different town altogether. Looking up the tracking number I’ve noticed someone put in a ticket to investigate. LD contacted UPS later to tell them about it (UPS is the WORST btw). I’ll just leave it where it is for now and see what happens.
I went vegetarian tonight and cooked up a white bean and swiss chard stew along with some parmesan garlic bread. Now swiss chard is not normally something as part of my repertoire but this actually came out pretty good!
Finally a fun night out in Boston! Down by the seaport! Meeting up with a friend and having a dinner by the water! (same friend we hung out with in Kennebunkport a little while ago. She lives in both places). In an igloo which was warm, ventilated, spacious, and fun! Would def. recommend and do again. It was cold outside though but nothing a New Englanders like us couldn’t handle (the eggnog cocktail warmed me up pretty good as well – as evidenced in pics #1 and 3 above – must have had something to do with the peanut butter whiskey). It did throw me for a little bit of a loop! Yeah, I was feeling pretty good by this point. The food was also quite tasty, I happened to go with the pumpkin ravioli and I really enjoyed it. The seaport is a really cool area now. Totally fun night!
Each day I am thankful for nights that turned into mornings, friends that turned into family, dreams that turned into reality and likes that turned into love. I know its going to be hard but may you all have a wonderful time this Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving Day! Check out this Green Bean Casserole we made this afternoon to go with:
All my stuff arrived today, the grill cover, the patio cover, my new headset, my gloves. We put the covers on their respective devices since it looks like rain for the next few days. We also got caught up on some gardening chores, like weeding and mulching and planting some more bulbs before the rains come. We also lopped some errant rose bush leaves that had been extending out into the driveway. LD also got a flu shot this afternoon. Also I was pretty proud of myself tonight with the dinner I concocted: Roasted chicken with a rosemary gravy long with sides of roasted broccoli, mashed potatoes, and a cranberry and apple chutney.
What do you think about my big pencil? It’s quite the handful, believe you me.
Last night we went to a winery with another couple friends of ours. We had seen this place featured on an episode of Chronicle which I just happened to randomly catch. The two things that caught our eye was that we saw in the video people that we knew and that they had this stuff called wine slushes, which is what you think it is. The place is really cute and we had a great time. We will definitely be going back there, especially since out friends became members, I personally sucked down two slushies while our friends did the traditional wine tastings. They liked their flavors so much they even bought a bunch of bottles. After staying there for a couple hours, we all headed back and sat around our fire pit for a few hours more. I didn’t get to bed until 2 am, I really enjoyed myself and I think everyone else did too.
This afternoon we went to the beach again. We are really becoming late summer beach bums this year. We ended up going to Rexhame, The water was pretty cold though but yet refreshing in a way. Must of stayed there around 4 hours or so. Once back home, I decided to use the grill to fire up some burgers from this week’s Hello Fresh instead of following their directions to fry them on a skillet. I think it worked out rather well, with the basil pesto and tomatoes. I did follow the directions to bake the potato fries though and used the oven for that.
Checked out the Parade of Sail up in Gloucester this morning. Like I mentioned before I hadn’t seen it since 2018. This year didn’t seem to have as many boats as that year but still a good time to view some scenic boats float by. LD came with this time and liked watching the dogs play in the water down below the boulevard, fetching balls and pieces of wood from the water thrown by their masters. Good thing we had the foresight to bring our beach chairs, which we set down right along the boulevard and watched the action. Toward the end I ventured over to more mountainous area and discovered what I like to call the hidden grotto. Pretty cool location. There was talk of maybe hitting the beach but the weather didn’t look that promising, plus we went yesterday, and there’s always tomorrow as a possibility.
We then headed for lunch at a place we like to go when we’re in the area. No wait! Got there just before it started getting busy. And it was outside with umbrellas! It spitting rain at us off and on but really nothing and didn’t effect us negatively. We ordered a bit too much this time so we’ll be having the leftovers for sinner tonight.
Finished off the early evening with a fire pit for a while. Did that for a few until the skies decided to start to drizzle again but thankfully I had been done with the fire by that point. After that we finally finished our leftovers while watching some 48 Hours reruns we had recorded from the night before and a movie on HBO, which was a recommendation from some friends of ours. I didn’t watch much of the movie as I had fallen asleep on my heating pad. Yes, it’s getting close to being that time of year again where I lay on this thing and end up napping for an hour or two.
I had to go out and buy some black work sneaks and boots for my upcoming position so I did that yesterday afternoon. I lucked out in that there’s a DSW not too far from here and I was able to find what I needed right away, so that was nice. I’m the type of person who likes to have everything I need at the ready, even if it won’t be needed for months in advance. That’s just me.
Spent the day at Duxbury beach again. Went into the water a couple of times. I ordered LD a new beach chair as we noticed hers was starting to be too worn. I actually ended up ordering for her the chair that I myself originally wanted but got sent something else that I ended up staying with because I actually liked it. Anyways, while we were in the water we noticed these weird gelatinous beings all around that your skin would brush against. Picking them out if the water they looked like some translucent sort of worm. Come to find out after looking it up, they were salps. I found these beings to have a fascinating life cycle – I had never heard of these creatures before. I assume the recent storm blew them more inland than they usually are.
By the time it became after 5 o’clock we were getting hungry so we headed over to Green Harbor – our go to place after the beach there. They are closing after Monday to end their season. They were out of lobster rolls but LD got shrimp and I went with the clam plate. The wait took over an hour which was annoying but we didn’t have any other plans so we just waited and got a little hangry. We finally got the food and ate it while watching a sunset over by a nearby marsh.
I had originally planned to do a fire pit tonight but we’re too tired now and it’s rather late. Perhaps I’ll light one tomorrow night.
Tomorrow my plan is to be getting up early to check out the schooners in G-town!
“Here comes the sun, doo-doo-doo-doo, here comes the sun. And I say it’s all right.”
The Beatles, Here Comes The Sun
It’s going to be a fantastic day, might as well start it out with a spectacular sunrise shot.
I did an experiment and fried up some hot dogs in the air fryer today and I’ve got to say, it’s pretty good. 6 minutes at 400 and it’s done! Probably going to be my go-to now in making them, unless I’m doing some grilling outside
Off to the beach this am, more later….
4.5 hours later today: Back from the beach, it was awesome! We played in the waves and got some sun, stayed there longer than ever so far. Just for the record we like going to Duxbury Beach Park which might actually technically be in Marshfield but it suits us. Definitely going in the early morning, which was new for us, is advantageous in many ways. Plus the weather today was just perfect, why can’t everyday be like today? Probably would have stayed even longer but we had to get back to home base because LD needed to attend a continuing conference online. We made it back just in the nick of time – cut it close with 5 minutes to spare!
On the streaming front we’ve just about finished season 2 of Mindhunter. Great show. As I mentioned before there’s a few more things I’d like to see within the next few weeks including Val, Sharp Objects, WW 1984, The Lighthouse, some 3 day special on A&E about serial killers, The Girl in the Fog, and Mare of Eastown to name a few.
Ended up the early evening by grilling up some steak tips and lighted up the fire pit and ate outside and relaxed. Now we’re salty and smoky! Perfect day!
The only negative part is LD got some sunburn on her arm!
Woke up this morning noticing my phone’s connection to the WIFI network had disappeared. When I went over to the router I noticed there weren’t any lights on it. Then I noticed that nothing in the house seemed to work. The power to every light and appliance was gone. I went to the basement and reset all the switches but that lead to no avail, so it must have been a neighborhood outage. Thankfully it didn’t last long though and was back up within 10 minutes. Of course I had to reset the clocks on the oven and microwave but otherwise everything went back to usual. I couldn’t even brew a cup of coffee because the power was out and I was jonesin’ for some caffeine. I thought about hitting a Dunks but then the power came on making the trip unnecessary.
It was kind of too hot to really do much of anything today so this afternoon we watched a couple of old Booker episodes on Tubi on the TV. One episode was clearly based off of the movie Die Hard with Booker playing the Bruce Willis part. Kinda cheesy. We also finally moved the exercise bike into the basement as we got sick of it taking up too much room in the den for months and sometimes tripping against it. After that we made a run to Target to get some supplies and then drove around to 3 different Dunkins to get LD an iced tea. For some reason a bunch of the franchises here close before the late afternoon on Sundays and perhaps every day but I was able to finally find one that was open for drive thru service.
For dinner we finally tried out the Air flyer and made French fries from potatoes and zucchini chips. It’s actually not bad. We may end up getting one with a bigger capacity at some point but as of now we’re still experimenting with air frying. I was going to grill but we decided that would be better down tomorrow night so for this evening we just did the chicken in the Instant Pot thing we do.
Today I had a moment where I thought to myself that I had become somewhat of a failure, and so this day had a vibe of being a bit of a downer. I know its not true of course but sometimes I can’t help feeling that way. A few minutes of vulnerability I guess.
What have I been up to lately? Not a whole hell of a lot.
We had some friends over last night for a BBQ. I had to run to the grocery store a couple of times to get some needed ingredients. LD made a special salad dressing from scratch and also a vodka/strawberry lemonade drink. I picked the lettuce we’ve been growing and used that in the salad. Just burgers and dogs and some corn cobs, pretty basic. Thankfully everything came out great and I was complimented on my grilling expertise, which has gotten better and better with time. After all the eating, I lit the firepit and we had smores. It was a hot day but actually it wasn’t all that bad as there was a breeze and the patio is generally shady in the late afternoon. In the supermarket I saw some Del’s Lemonade Shandy Beer which I’d never seen before so I bought some and decided to try it, and I actually like it!
My microSD card came the other day and I inserted it into my phone, now rocking another 512GB on top of the 128GB I have internally. That should last me for a while. My grill cleaner also came yesterday so today I went ahead and gave the grill a deep cleaning. Strangely even though I ordered it from Amazon, it came from the Home Depot, which I thought was a little weird. If you’re interested it’s a grill cleaner by the makers of Simple Green. Anyways, the grill has never been deep cleaned since we got it, plus I wanted to get rid of the built up grease on the underside of the lid which made it look like peeling paint. I removed all the grates and flavorizer bars and gave them a good spray and scrub down. LD helped as well! We also picked up some more day lilies from the garden lady this morning. At this point we’ll have so many! Late in the afternoon we soaked the bulbs in a pail of water for a few hours before putting them into the ground, as per the garden lady instructions.
Gametime: Headlong Hunt.
Does anybody really care what I write here? You can leave a comment if you really do, I’d appreciate it.
Above is a picture from a few days ago that I took looking up from the ground, with the trees and the daffodils in bloom. On a separate note, I don’t know if anybody watches the news channel NECN but lately they’ve been showcasing some of my photos on television, the latest being the rocks and sea scene from Salisbury where I got my first Covid shot. It’s always nice to see that folks think some of pics are worthy of that honor.
Friday was a day of basically just running some errands and cleaning up the house a bit, doing some runs to CVS and the ATM and getting ready for today’s (Saturday) festivities. Today looked to be a somewhat packed day.
It all started with making a strawberry salad with our own homemade strawberry dressing, which came out very tasty. I sautéed up some spinach, zucchini, mushrooms, and pecans as well for various side dishes. This was all in preparation for an outdoor gathering we were having with a friend and her new boyfriend, first time meeting. Then it was off to Wegman’s for a grocery pickup for some more items for the outing. Put together our own turkey burgers from scratch imbued with some spinach and feta to also cook on the grill. It was a good little get together and I think we all enjoyed ourselves. We finished off the afternoon with some s’mores using the fire pit and the spits that we got as a gift a little while back.
In the interim we had the gas company come out because there’d been a gas smell up and down the street for a couple of weeks now. Eventually it lead to some underground pipe that the smell was coming through a catch basin across the street. They deemed it a Level 2 decision – meaning they may have a crew come out in the summer to deal with it. Not a high priority but put on a list to be looked at at some point, no danger.
After our guests left (they wanted to see the tulips in the Boston Garden and maybe catch a sunset there) LD put the finishing painting touches on her table project. It’s almost done! My Butterfly House parts also came delivered today, we might try to put that together tomorrow, along with planting that free tree sapling I got a few days ago.
Now we’re pretty wiped so I think we’ll relax with some leftovers and some television and reading.
I got some really great gifts this year – the big prize was this giant bean bag that I can lay in (like, my whole body fits inside it – it’s so large). Takes up a good chunk of the room which might be problematic but who cares! Also got some needed clothing, a wonderful photobook of our adventures from 2020 utilizing a lot of the personal photos from the year, a Carson mousepad and a heating pad and bear slippers. The last two I’ve been using for a while already because I got to open those early! The best was watching Carson open his gifts!
For lunch I went ahead and made and prepared some Cranberry Chicken and Herby Pan Stuffing. I’ve discovered that I think shallots are way better than onions. Will do a frozen pizza in the oven tonight.
I had to pick up one of the lighted reindeers out front. The winds knocked him over but overall, the wind didn’t seem to be that big a deal and that was a good thing. It was the only thing that fell out of place.
Today’s movie watch was Elf. (A movie I’ve actually never seen until now), can you believe it?) Last night was National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.
Stupid embeds on Instagram don’t work anymore because they changed the API (thanks again Facebook for screwing more things up) so you’ll just need to click this link and watch to see some of my work that made the local news:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CH3gQggHHs5/
Did a little yard work this morning – finishing cleaning up the last of the fallen oak leaves from the yard and by the gutter spouts and other areas such as the patio where they clump up that had been bugging me over the last couple of days. Thankfully this should be the last of it as most of trees back here look pretty bare now. Also did some generous watering of the baby sourwood and pine trees. Really want those to do well. Maybe it’s me but I think the pine is actually growing already, it definitely has little pine cones starting to grow out of it in various places. You need to give them 10-15 gallons of water daily ideally which is a lot but I’m doing what I can. I also planted a garlic clove in a pot in the house just for fun and it’s already got two green sprouts shooting up from the dirt. This one is more of just a fun experiment for myself just to see it grow.
We hit Rexhame Beach in the early afternoon for some exercise, sun and nature time, especially since today is the last nice warmish day especially this late into November. It’s also the best beach for it’s selection of colorful and special looking rocks, at least in my opinion. It’s where I found my heart rock – a one in a billion find if you ask me and I feel very lucky to have found it. It currently sits on the windowsill next to a table where I do my web work.
We collected a bunch more rocks for our collections – a colorful selection of geology to adorn the windowsills.
Finally it was off to cook a turkey – we had defrosted it a little too early and today was the last day it would keep until cooking and so in it went. I basted it every 45 minutes until the bird was done. I think we did a pretty good job, not everyday we cook a whole bird. Needless to say we’ll be eating turkey all week and making various meals out of it. So we’re a little early, NBD!
The story behind the photo: There’s this cemetery just along the Somerville/Arlington line that has these amazing groves of trees that turn red in the fall and I love to photograph there when that happens and so I did and so here’s the result. Also I posted yesterday’s photo of leaves strewn about the Somerville bike path to the Davis Square group on FB and it’s getting a lot of love over there so that makes me feel pretty good. (available).
Things on the the to-do list today:
Went to Home Depot and got some different knobs for the kitchen cabinets. Got singles of three different kinds just to see how they look. I also picked up some kindling and some firewood for the pit even though we have a bunch, just to have on-hand.
Went to CVS to get my mom a birthday card and some Zyrtec for LD. It took me a while to find it as this particular CVS is in the process of rearranging all the aisles in the store (AGAIN!) and so everything is all in different places.
Set up LD’s printer scanner to finally be able to scan documents and wirelessly transmit the output to a shared Windows drive on the laptop.
Take out the goat yoga mats from Wednesday and clean them up (started the process, need to finish that up tomorrow).
Spent a little time at the sanctuary to see if I could get any foliage shots and see the animals. Didn’t have much goat time but did see a lot of chickens and our friend Devon was there too to chat with. She volunteers there all the time and is pretty knowledgeable about all the animals that live there. For some reason the turkey was pretty feisty today and kept following and squabbling at LD the whole time.
I didn’t have a chance yet to set up the Amazon Echo Dot that LD picked up on Prime Day. It remains to be seen if we end up actually using it or giving it to a relative. Not really into Alexa listening to everything but what can you do? I also still need to hang some new curtain rods that have been laying around for about a week now. Try to get to that tomorrow as well.
I had the weirdest dream last night. I was sitting on a couch with a few other people that I believe were all elementary and high school friends from the neighborhood. Alex and Eddie Van Halen were also on the couch with us and it was like we all grew up with them as they were our school buddies as well. I was on one end of the couch and Eddie was on the other end with two of our friends between us and Alex in the middle. It also seemed like we known them all our lives and that they actually lived with my family in my house as we were growing up. At some point in the dream I was next to Alex and he was telling some story but he was spraying it as he was talking I could feel the droplets fall all over my face and then I was trying to hold my breath and fearing I would get COVID and then I woke up. Told you it was a weird dream.
For dinner I cooked up some Bruschetta Zucchini boats with couscous and Melted Italian Cheeses. You cut the zucs in half and gut the insides so it’s like a boat, roast them, them stuff them with the completed couscous, bruschetta and cheese and then broil it so the cheese melts all over it, Have to say, it was pretty delicious and simple to prepare.
Update: I’ve added the Nauset shot now up for purchase.
I’ve always loved lighthouses, just everything about them, their location, their various looks, their history, the people who lived in the them and tended the light, their bravery. I just think it’s pretty cool. I’m sure many people feel the same way. I’m very lucky to live in new England where there are so many. Boston was home to the very first lighthouse in America after all (and it’s still there!)
I joined a lighthouse of New England group and posted my shot of Nauset Light from this summer. Seems to be getting a lot of traction, hundreds of likes and comments. Makes me feel good but also reinforced the fact to me that I need to focus some of my work toward the proper audiences. Anyways here’s a shot of two of the three sister lighthouses which originally were where the current Nauset Light is. You can read a history of it all here. There’s a nice trail you can walk between the current and former lighthouses. I like the vibe I created for this photo – I feel it looks a little spooky. Will probably do another Cape trip in the fall for a night or two. In somewhat unrelated photography news I submitted a photo for the local town calendar but we’ll see if any thing comes of it. I’ve submitted things before but never really got any traction out of them.
Made pizzas for lunch today using up the remainder of things in the fridge like roasted tomatoes and eggplant that we had made a few days ago. Last night we made a walnut encrusted chicken with honey mustard and a side of roasted broccoli with some bread with melted cheese and butter. Today I’ll probably grill some turkey burgers (had done a couple of those a few days ago as well). We also made apple sauce using the Instant Pot last night with some apples that had been in the fridge for a quite a while. It’s kinda good to get through and use all these items!
Enjoyed some nice quiet time out on the patio this afternoon, reading and I even napped at one point in the deck chair. Been trying to get through a book I purchased a couple of years ago on Giza and the Pyramids by Lehner and Hawass (two quite famous and respected egyptologists). It’s a huge tome with lots of amazing photographs and very many pages. It weighs 6 pounds!
Saw this little guy on a hike a couple of weeks ago and he was singing up a storm. Seemed pretty friendly too! I think it’s a Song Sparrow. Did you know that they learn to sing by imitating their fathers? And that by the time a young male is a few months old, will have formed the basis for his own courtship tune? I believe that is what I was hearing from this little guy!
This morning I went ahead and cooked up a new dish for us to have a little brunch: Charred Tomato and Ricotta, with roasted walnuts, some minced herbs, and topped with a balsamic glaze, all resting on top of toasted sourdough bread. Have to say, it wasn’t bad!
I’m currently reading Motherless Brooklyn. Come to find out LD had it on her bookshelf from way back! I really like it. It’s different then the movie in so far as I love the way it delves into the mind of the main character and his Tourette’s Syndrome. Also the time period is the 1980s whereas the movie is the 1950s. Also, I’ve yet to see the Power Broker in the novel. Perhaps that was only in the movie? Either way, this book is really great, two thumbs up from me. The movie could never solve the most common problem with any adaptation: The internal cannot be made external.
Still in a Cape Cod mood so tonight I’m brewing up some Pineapple Coolers. I think the little guy above might approve. Here’s the recipe:
Combine all in a blender and blend until smooth. Add more ice for thicker frozen cocktail. More mixture into glasses and garnish with a pineapple round, lime wedge, and sprig of mint.
We got a lot of things today! Got rid of a lot of old books that were on the bookcase in the den and deposited them in a couple of Little Libraries about town, moved the new freezer into the unfinished part of the basement (after cleaning it up and making some room/neater) and other miscellaneous things. Planning to cook some steaks on the grill for tonight’s dinner after which I will imbibe on the Pineapple Coolers.
Here’s a fun little game I discovered called Alice. It took me a little bit to solve all the puzzles but they weren’t too bad.
Also, here’s a cooking tip which you might know already: when you’re done roasting some carrots put lemon zest and some juice from a lemon right on top of them as they come out of the oven – the flavor of the carrot and the lemon, I find, go really good together. Now I’m not much of a carrot eater so this was a new discovery for me anyway but if you’ve never done it – give it a shot next time.
Does anyone else’s CNN channel freeze up every so often for a couple of seconds? Seems to be the only station that does it. Pretty annoying.
More later…
Visited a Little Library down in JP while doing an appointment and happened to pick up some new books for my reading agenda. Not sure how engaged I will be or if I like them or not but I’m giving them a chance:
Meanwhile I’m still getting through The Power Broker. Funny how times change – back then, expressways and thruways were all the rage whereas now they are seem as a detriment. It all depends on the time you live in I suppose. Values change.
Also had breakfast at a place called Ula which was pretty good and a hip sort of a place.
Gametime! Currently playing Tasty Jewel. It’s one of those match-3 type games but gets really interesting in the later levels.
I bought a new mailbox to replace the one out front. The door has rusted off it’s hinges and although I could repair it I think it’ll be nice to have a new one. I plan on installing it tomorrow.
I was somewhat saddened to hear that the No Name Restaurant in Boston had closed down after being in business for over 100 years. I had been there a couple of times over the years, but truth be told, I always did find it really hard to get to. Once you got to the area, it literally was on a working pier in the Seaport. They actually did get their seafood directly from down the pier, only a few feet from the place.
I do have one story from there though. I remember going there, don’t remember with who – probably my family, and we were seated next to this woman who had a doll with her which she placed in her own chair at the table and would order for the doll. I think she was a regular and would always order for the doll, even though the doll never took a bite of any of its food. One time the lady’s (what I assume was her) boyfriend arrived and he went along with it all. Strange thing was they arrived separately and left separately too. I always wondered if she lost a child before and used the doll as a replacement. Anyways, that’s my No Name story.
What am I thankful for? It’s pretty simple really.
Each day I am thankful for nights that turned into mornings, friends that turned into family, dreams that turned into reality and likes that turned into love. May you all have a wonderful time this Thanksgiving, with friends and family. Enjoy. Happy Thanksgiving Day!
Went to the Sanctuary today. Goats hung out with us which was fun. Sadly, the cat we had thoughts of adopting from there was adopted by someone else a few days ago. Maybe it’s for the best at this time though.
Afterwards hit up visit to Trader Joe’s in Foxborough (by where the Pats play) to get some groceries for the week. We’ve already cooked up some mushroom pizzas, ricotta bake, and some mustard glazed chicken.
What else? Watched the end of the Celtics game, flipping between that and Law & Order reruns on We TV. A typical low-key Sunday.
The above picture is one I took along Commonwealth Avenue in Boston a little while back. I always found the look of these two buildings rather cool. Come to find out, the “sisters” have an interesting back story! I still learn something new everyday!