whew

after five days of turkey dinner, the gravy, stuffing, and peas are all gone. But there is still lots of turkey to deal with....one dinner could be a turkey drumstick, black-eyed peas, and cornbread. Maybe that tomorrow.....and I was trying to remember turkey and noodles....a casserole? I can google it.....

well, the rain got here

in the afternoon....not too cold or windy, so I've been sitting out on the front porch just watching it come down pretty steady.....

storm front

to the north-west, part of it at Athens now, and looking like it might be heading this way....so I'm trying to figure if it will start raining if I go for another walk......they say rain today, clear Tuesday, rain the next day after that....

warmer today

42F at 7:30 AM......sun coming through the south window of the living room right now....I'm going over to the drug store for a couple of things.....had french toast and sausage for breakfast.....microwaved a plate of turkey dinner last night....going to be the same thing this evening I guess.....I bet turkey enchilada would work.....

beyond freezing

29.5 F, clear, calm....bit brisk on my sun-up walk.....Clinton will play Myrtle Beach Dec. 5th for the AAA division state football championship....go Red Devils! That's the same day Clemson plays Georgia Tech for the ACC championship. So it's pigskin heaven in the Upstate, pretty much. I saw in the paper this morning an article about it being whale watching season off the Carolina coast.....hadn't thought of that, being only familiar with the whale watching season off the California coast.....It's WB's birthday, so I'm going to drive over to Ora for a few minutes I guess, and then at noon it's Clemson vs. South Carolina on ESPN. Lunch will be turkey, as will dinner. Bourbon gravy is pretty tasty.

freezing

on my walk at 7:30.....32 degrees, clear and bright, not much wind. I just put a 12.86 lb. bird in the oven.....I put a box of cornbread stuffing mixed with the leftover creamed onions in it, and stuck the thermometer into the stuffing, when the stuffing gets to 165, it should be done.....will take roughly four hours? The bird has a pop-up timer, too. I won't stuff myself as much as yesterday, but I will have meals for a while involving turkey in some form.....recipe in the paper for Thai-style turkey curry....hmm..it calls for coconut milk, and other strange things...probably won't try that one....

Thanksgiving evening

Had a very nice afternoon at Cindy and Matt's house, with their kids and her parents there, and Uncle Ed's sister also.....they have a great old house, and we had the whole nine yards traditional Thanksgiving dinner.....seems like we ate for hours....back home now and can hardly move....a good day.

39 in the fog

the cream sauce came out on the thin side, but maybe it will all cook down some in the oven....I suppose some times I should read a recipe and measure things, instead of just faking it by memory of the way I did it five or six years ago.....

Happy Thanksgiving

to all.....was clear and crisp just after dawn, but now fog has rolled in.....maybe it will be burning off before I drive over to Laurens......have a good one!

sun did come out

got warm enough to sit out on the porch for a while.....if it's like this tomorrow, it will be a pleasant holiday, weather-wise.....

sun might burn through

later, but so far it's another gray day, 50 outside. Just got back from a walk, got some things in the dryer.....thinking of a grilled corn beef, swiss cheese, and kraut on rye for lunch. Last night I just made a swiss cheese omelette, with a toasted biscuit. I used some oregano in the omelette.....It looks like everything public shuts down for the four day weekend, the schools and the city anyway.......this Friday and Saturday you can buy a gun without any sales tax; some strange state law......

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Happy Holidays....

drizzle

drizzle when I went to the library and the store....more drizzle on the park walk, but not enough to worry about......did find some books to read, nothing in the mail but ads.....almost every time I do get mail, there is something trying to sell me life insurance.....what's the point in that? Money doesn't matter when you're dead, I don't think.....

not as cold this morning

low clouds, no wind......in a little bit I'm going to the library and the grocery store.....Cindy invited me to Laurens for Thanksgiving.....Aunt Addie and Uncle Ed will be there.....so I'll put off cooking my turkey until Friday, I guess.....I told Cindy I would bring creamed onions, if I can find the pearl onions....I'm pretty sure I saw them the other day at BI-LO. They are saying it will be in the 60's on Thanksgiving....in the 50's today.....possibility of snow flurries in the mountains over the weekend......

cold chopped chicken liver

on a biscuit, with some pickle slices on the side. For supper, beef stew from a can. It's for sure stew weather, still cold and damp out. I did walk over by the park, pretty well bundled up, multiple layers......took a little nap after lunch.....

cars had their wipers on

sort of a blowing mist and light drizzle on my morning walk.....high of 51 predicted for today....I think it rained most of the night...don't think I need to drive anywhere today.....library books are due tomorrow, Tuesday, I'm pretty sure.....

after dark

it's still raining and cold out.....I still have chicken livers, so I cooked up some more of those with biscuits and more green beans, and made better pan gravy this time.....I bought some of that Wondra sauce and gravy flour, and whisked it in hot water before mixing it with the leavings in the frying pan.....I'm practicing for turkey day....didn't do much of anything today, no games on I was interested in....took a nap, read a book.....

you live and you learn

"In this country, there are only three companies which print U.S. Postage Stamps, and one of them is in Clinton." Raining pretty good here before noon Sunday, chilly outside. Spent more at the grocery store than I had planned, since they had the kind of olive oil I like two for one, so I stocked up on that....and they had a pound of store brand swiss chess for only thirty cents more than a half pound of Kraft....couldn't resist.....so I had to get rye bread too, for grilled swiss on rye....

storm on the way

I can see it on the radar, so I'm going out to the store now and maybe get back before it gets here...I just need a couple of things, if I can remember what they were.....I'll figure it out, I guess.....sausage scramble with sourdough toast for breakfast, black coffee, orange juice .....45 degrees outside....

clouding up to the west

Clinton beat Union County last night, so the Red Devils advance to play against Daniel for the Upper State AAA title.....if they win that they play the low country winner for the state championship. Wofford plays Furman today in football, and it's even televised....but it's on the same time as Clemson and Virginia, so I don't think Wofford-Furman will have a huge viewership. If Clemson wins today and Dec. 5th, they get into the Orange Bowl, or something. I might take a walk over into downtown, somebody had stuff out in the hardware store parking lot, a yard sale....I saw that when I went for the paper....could check it out.....last night I had the leftover short ribs, and tonight it's going to get cold and damp they say, so soup sounds like a good idea.

bright, windy

was 40 at 7:30 on the newspaper walk. Around 9:30 I went on the mill walk, and it was 52 still. Probably not going to get much above 60 today. Clinton Red Devils play in the Upstate semi-final in their football division, over in Union county tonight. Panthers lost late last night, and are probably out of play off contention.....Chargers still have a chance? Saturday on Thanksgiving weekend is Football Day, when Clemson plays Carolina....I'm looking forward to turkey and cold stuffing on a dinner roll while watching the big game....sort of a tradition for me.....

chicken livers, dirty rice, green beans

I rolled the chicken livers in cajun fish fry, to spice them up a bit to go with the leftover dirty rice....made a little pan gravy to go over it all....now I'm stuffed, and sitting waiting for the evening news to come on.....maybe I can watch some college B-ball until the Carolina Panthers and the Dolphins come on later....and maybe I can stay awake through that game....but since it doesn't start until 8 our time, I'll probably be falling asleep by half-time.....the weather ended up pretty nice in the afternoon, 65 or so.......

fog

100% humidity.....but it's not too cold, no wind. The short ribs of beef braised in apple juice and topped with sauerkraut were very tasty....there's easily enough left for another dinner....the hybrid cooking method of microwaving the meat first and then crock-potting it for only four or five hours instead of all day worked perfectly......the Greenville paper had a recipe in yesterday for corn pudding....I enjoyed some of that at one of the Ora covered dish dinners, and so now I'll try making it sometime....probably after Thanksgiving.....well, about time for a walk....

that's that

did my Thanksgiving shopping....WalMart advertised turkeys for 40 cents a pound, but I went to BiLo anyway, where I usually shop....got a 12 pounder for six bucks....and with the turkey purchase and my regular grocery shopping, I get 20 cents a gallon off the next time I fill up at Shell....which is only every six weeks or so.....and I got all the other stuff for turkey dinner, plus a disposable roasting pan, and a whisk for gravy....I didn't have one of those anymore....and I got some chicken livers, and some short ribs of beef to braise with sauerkraut....and enough meals to last 'til turkey day, after which I'll go on a turkey diet for a while.....low 50s, windy, cloudy, probably going to rain by the afternoon......

more tuesday

Went for a walk and later had some lunch.....a corned beef burger with grilled onions and pickles....the grocery store ad comes with the Tuesday junk mail, and they have turkeys with your card and a $25 purchase for 49 cents a pound.....I'm not good at math, but isn't that five bucks for ten pounds? And if you buy the turkey on this deal, you get another 10 cents a gallon off at Shell. Damn, how can I afford NOT to buy the turkey, even if it will take me 'til Christmas to eat it all? I imagine I can find $25 of other stuff I can use....I'm thinking roasted turkey with apple and raisin corn bread stuffing, bourbon gravy, petit pois....and maybe dinner rolls....I can always use those later.....mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce I don't really need, for one person the whole nine yards is sorta overkill....

change in the weather

the few sunny days are gone, and it's cloudy with north winds....might start raining this afternoon....yesterday they had cars parked so you couldn't get into the McDonalds parking lot....that's because they are tearing it down to build a "new concept" replacement. No more golden arches over the building....it will be brick faced and designed to fit in with the "historical" character of downtown....it will have dual drive-thrus! Cool. No more kiddy playland either, those were an insurance nightmare.....

bubbly bouncy pop

I turned on the station that's indie and college new music.....it's all bright and cheery and bouncing along.....what world do these people live in? I must be out of touch with reality again, dammit....happens from time to time I suppose....or maybe I just tuned in during the perky pop hour?

another pleasant morning

more or less.....the guy who fixed things at the Resort had shown me the trick of just turning the stopper on the sewer line outside the bathroom upside down and just leaving it sitting there instead of screwed in....that way if the line backs up, it can't back all the way up into the house....well, when I brought the trashcan back in from the street this morning, I noticed that the stopper had in fact floated up, so I looked and the line was backed up. So I used this kind of plunger I got a while back that you pump up and down real fast and it sends resonant shock waves into whatever is plugging the plumbing....it worked. But I also went to the store and bought a bottle of that stuff for cleaning the line to the street. It had been over a year since I had used any of that, I think. I also picked up all the sticks the hurricane had blown out of the trees, and put them out at the curb for the city to pick up. They usually do that on Tuesdays, on my street.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sjtingle/

It was beautiful driving in all the Fall colors.....I didn't get as far as the national forest, I just went to the Horseshoe Falls area of the state park, about ten miles from the house.....see pix per usual....it's nice out there....saw one other car parked, but didn't see any other people.....warm enough today to open up some windows and let the air in.....the Charger game is at 4:15 Eastern time, I think....they don't list it in the local TV sports, but I might get it on that NFL channel, I'll have to check.....anyway, have a good Sunday.....

peaceful Sunday morning

nice outside....just been sitting and reading the paper, listening to the radio some....maybe I'll go drive through the woods later, over in the national forest land around Whitmere or somewhere like that......

oh boy

those ribs sure were tasty.....Carolina is hanging in there pretty well with Florida....Clemson looked good, except for the PAT....what's with that?

last night

while I had on the Celtics and the Hawks, the remote stopped working, so this morning I went to the store and got batteries, and they had Progresso soup 2 for 1 so I got clam chowder and chicken pot pie.....and I also got ribs to bake with a yam during the football this afternoon.....and country sausage was on sale too, so I can have sausage and french toast for Sunday breakfast, and then use some sausage with the dirty rice mix I got....that will be good for a couple of meals itself....very nice here this morning, clear and warm....so I'm going to walk by the old mill, and then I need to vacuum and mop also......

in the afternoon

it's mostly sunny and 68....so I can sit on the porch in some comfort....walked the park a while ago, had some lunch....might take a nap.....

sunny and warm?

That's what the weather lady was saying for today, but right here right now it's still windy and overcast.....I guess it is some degrees warmer.....

walked the park

after lunch.....still relatively nasty outdoors, but they are saying it will warm up to the 70's for the weekend.....I'll believe that when I see it....can't seem to get into reading today....I'll pick up a book and then just put it back down....happens sometimes.....

stocking cap and wind breaker

on the morning walk, windy, chilly, cloudy....but not raining .....did rain more during the night....I think it said 88 trees had fallen down in Greenville County during this storm ......record rainfall for the date at GSP airport, etc....yesterday I fixed a hot toddy with dark rum and apple juice in the microwave....that works. Conch Republic rum.....the lady at the ABC said the Conch Republic was one of those little island countries down in the West Indies.....well, not quite. The back of the bottle says the Conch Republic is what Key West called itself when it seceded from the Union back in the 1980's some time.....I think it's a Bacardi product, but is about half the price of the Bacardi branded stuff.....anyway, had a poached egg on sourdough toast for breakfast, and lunch is going to be a homemade hamburger.....a homemade hamburger always seems to be better than any fast food hamburger.......

Had to take a walk

got tired of sitting inside, so I put on a stocking cap and a wind breaker and went ahead in the 52 degree light blowing drizzle, with gusts to 35 mph....felt good. It's raining a little harder now, a couple of hours after the walk, still blowing....I went and rounded up the front porch chairs, and they blew away again....had the last of the corn soup for lunch, with a slice of sourdough toast. Oatmeal with raisins and bran flakes for breakfast.....haven't decided on dinner yet, a couple of choices.....

still stormy

the chairs blew off the front porch in the night....not walking weather this morning, but it's all moving to the north and east they say.....maybe it will be nicer in the afternoon sometime....I drove to the gas station and got the Greenville paper, and the weekly Clinton paper, which usually doesn't have too much of interest in it, but today it had a front page article about the Confucius Institute opening at PC.....they put up an eight foot tall statue of Confucius..."The statue is the largest of the Chinese philosopher in the country..." Is this all a front for Commie propaganda? They want to start teaching Chinese in grade school.....on Dish I get CCTV, ChiComTelevision (well, they call it Chinese Cultural TeleVision)....it's got lots of good shows....like the one where they went up in the mountains to this place where the local specialty food is giant noodles....I mean these noodles were two feet wide and twelve feet long.....one of those suckers feeds an extended family for a week, or something like that.....

Ida stayed home

anyway, even if there wasn't a hurricane.....no where to go much....no newspaper walk this morning, too much rain and some wind....I'll drive to the store later and get a paper when I get bread and orange juice, and whatever.....

hurricane clouds today

and the rain from Ida through Tuesday, is what the computers are modeling.....so it's going to be wetter rather than colder for a couple of days, with the air moving from the south....I can stay inside and eat soup.....

that will cures what ails you

I had a little bit of sniffles and sneeze....so I wanted swap-meet soup:E-Z elote sopa....one can whole kernel corn, one can red enchilada sauce, one can green enchilada sauce, one can chicken broth, 1/4 cup diced onion, olive oil, parmesan cheese, Fritos.....you could remember cilantro and garlic, but I didn't.....In a large sauce pan heat olive oil, enough to cover the bottom of the pan....saute diced onion briefly, add drained corn and roast briefly, add enchilada sauces and chicken broth, bring to boil, reduce heat to medium low, simmer for two or three hours, checking every once in a while and stirring.....maybe 45 minutes before you want to eat, uncover, reduce heat to low, and add perhaps 1/2 cup grated cheese and one handful of Fritos, about as much as a small bag of those....stir well to blend in the cheese, and let simmer down until the smell fills the house and you just have to go ahead and eat. The corn should be fully tender cooked, and the Fritos about like the tortilla in tortilla soup. Made my nose run, and put a fire in my belly, which is what I was after. Looks like enough for two or three more meals, I bet.

in 1900

the population of the United States was 3.9 million.....anyway, I did go to the store, and this afternoon will try sopa elote, with no fat low sodium chicken stock.....for lunch I went crazy and spent $2.18 at Burger King for the double cheeseburger they kept showing during football yesterday, with a one dollar "value drink".....I got Dr. Pepper.....I was the only customer in there.....next door at the Waffle House, there were half a dozen cars maybe....this was 10:30 on a Sunday morning.....it's warm enough right now to have some windows open, let some air in.....

population

San Diego County has a population of 3 million.....South Carolina has a population of 4.5 million....gives you some perspective......Sunday morning, Clemson did win that game, but I went to bed before it was over.....tequila french toast for breakfast.....I used up all the eggs, so I think I will go to the store this morning, and look for stuff to make chicken soup or something like that too.....was 10 degrees warmer this morning than yesterday morning at the same time.....I can get some cash at the store also, there's one dollar in my wallet.....

OK

for the food part today, I'm thinking Grits Machaca con huevos.....

Gamecocks and Razorbacks

S. Carolina is down by 10 late in the 4th....oh well.....watching with Robin Trower playing through the stereo, so I don't have to hear the commercials....looks like Arkansas is about to score again....Clemson is on tonight, or this might be all the football I can take today.....

dobro sitar style

In Guitar Player this guy described the technique for making a dobro sound like a sitar....it's really cool! Once you figure out which plectrum and which slide to use, you can get all that sitar buzzing and sympathetic string thing going.....amusement for hours......at least for me, anyway....34 degrees this morning, so it was a ski jacket walk on the dawn patrol....still in the 40s now, but I might get in another walk before the Carolina game at 12:30 or whenever it is exactly....maybe I'll walk through downtown rather than around the park, for a change.....

in the afternoon

it did warm up to around 60, so I took the park walk, and then sat out on the porch for a while....

looks beautiful outside

but it's only 55 and windy....I think I'll just stay inside for right now. It was 37 on my morning walk, with frost in the shady places. I had that pot-roast sandwich for lunch, it was excellent....I don't remember where it was that they used to have pot-roast sandwich on the menu all the time...maybe it was that place near Palomar Hospital, that I went into a few times, when somebody was in the hospital....eating apples instead of bananas, I've lost about four pounds.....

The Book of Air and Shadows

was the first Michael Gruber book I read a couple of months ago, and this week I picked up another one....The Forgery of Venus. The first one was a very involving and somehow scary work....this one is full blaze mindwrenching....a printed drug? Anyway, I can only read a few pages at a time, and then put it down and try to think of something else....it ought to last a while that way, I guess....I also got some David Gemmell paperbacks....he's good too.....late afternoon, listening to the Rewind station, the one that plays tunes from the cassette era.....

Sun came up

as usual....blue sky, bright, 40 degrees on my first walk.....I've got to work on that pot-roast, so I'll have it for supper tonight....and cold pot-roast with bread-and-butter pickle slices and a little mayo sounds like a tasty lunch sandwich.....yesterday's lunch was a cold biscuit sandwich with canned corn beef, sharp cheddar cheese, the pickle slices....but no mayo (actually I buy some kind of generic low fat spread)...oh, and a handful of Fritos....I've been wondering if you could substitute Fritos in tortilla soup.....anyway, nice looking Fall day, upper 60's expected, but patchy frost and lows in the mid 30's for Friday morning. Coos Bay has a high surf warning, but I don't think Caroline goes surfing much.....

old mill village bathrooms

were apparently entered off the back porch.....according to a little piece I was reading in the Clinton paper....and some of the sheds in the backyards started off as outhouses? I knew the bathroom and laundry porch at my house had been remodeled somewhere along the line....there are some houses in the village that look like the same model as mine, but they don't have the laundry part enclosed, just roofed over....and you still have to go out the kitchen door and onto the back porch to get to the bathroom I guess. I bet it was cold in the bathroom in the Winter, since the house was heated only by the two coal burning fireplaces.....the Company supplied coal.....well, I went to the grocery store and the gas station already, and the mail has been....just ads....so I guess I'll go for a walk.....still cool enough to need a jacket this morning, high of 62 predicted for the day.....they had apples two bags for one, so I've got lots of apples.....I think I'll do the dish again with fried apples wedges and sweet potato slices.....

lovely afternoon

I got some good library books, and walked by the park, and had leftover pork-rice for a hot lunch....looking at heated up pot-roast over biscuit for supper.....had a good session with the guitar today, some days I can get it working, and some days I just give up....took a few random outside pix.....see at the usual place, if you like.....

I didn't feel hungry at dinnertime

yesterday, so I just ate an apple and a chunk of cheese later on before going to bed. This morning I'm going to the library and the drug store. It was 39 point something when I went for the paper....clear sky, sunshine.....maybe CVS will have cashews on sale, they do have them quite often....I miss the raw nuts from Bate's.....

it did warm up to about 65

so I went for my walk after lunch....after that I think I fell asleep sitting up on the sofa for a bit....anyway, later I was out sitting on the front porch, and cousin Emily came walking by....I had seen her with Aunt Becky at Uncle Bill's services....she lives just two blocks away apparently, there is a brick fourplex right near the Post Office, and her work provides her an apartment there for six days, and then she lives with the kids at Thornwell for eight days, etc....she is a housekeeper or house-mother, what ever they call it....works at the orphanage....she was just out walking for exercise, like I do I guess....it's a nice neighborhood for that anyway.....

cold, cloudy, sharp north wind

so the walk to get the paper was brisk, to say the least.....maybe it will warm up enough by the afternoon to be comfortable on the mill park walk, or I can just bundle up more, I guess....the Panthers won yesterday, with their defense mostly.....and it looks like the Yanks are on their way to buying another championship.....the pot-roast came out good, and it's good weather for it. I've got library books due tomorrow, so I could sit and read for an hour or so and probably finish them up.....

time change days

are always slightly disjointed.....but this is "real" time, right....the sun is directly overhead at noon, as it should be. Breakfast was french toast and the last of the spam.....lunch was cold fried chicken and raisin slaw....the whole house smells like the simmering pot roast.....

raining when I went to sleep

and raining when I woke up.....and I got a good 8 hours sleep, I think....but it stopped raining by the time I'd had breakfast, so I could do my walk and get the Sunday paper. I put the chuck roast and veggies in the crock pot already, so that will be for dinner tonight. I used the last of the orange juice this morning, so I'll go to the store for more of that, and maybe some cole slaw for a lunch side.....boy the wind is kicking up.....I should turn the calendar I guess....November already....