Tag: book club

Wednesday’s Theme Music

Overture, hit the lights, this is, the night of nights.

Yes, it’s book club Wednesday. K is hosting. The house is clean as a whistle. I don’t understand that expression but know it from older people using it in my youth. As a developing elder, I feel it incumbent to carry the tradition forward so that future generations can ask, what does that mean? I understand it from context and use, sure, the eighteenth-century expression doesn’t seem straightforward to my mind.

The vegan brownies are done and turned out great. She used the same recipe and materials used for the disastrous test brownies. Shrug. The other little vegan cream cheese with cranberry sauce and orange zest with puff pastry will be baked later today.

We picked up four bottles of wine for the book club but this isn’t a wine drinking book club. One or two will have a glass of wine. This just gives them options. Our wine stand’s stock declined in the last two years. We usually had twenty to thirty bottles on hand. We were down to twelve. The beverage predictions are that one bc member will drink decaf, three will drink water, and the rest will drink hot tea.

White fog envelopes the sky out of the house’s west side today. New snow fell. Just two inches but enough to cocoon our land in white. White pine branches protect scattered patches of green grass. Black asphalt and dark wet cement rivers through. But bold sunshine is skating in from the east from its rising time of 6:35, blasting our eyes off the snow when we look out the windows on the other side. It’s 35 F now but we expect 41 F before the sun puts us in its rearview at 6:09 this evening.

This is Tuesday, March 8, 2023.

The last original member of Lynyrd Skynyrd, Gary Rossington, died a few days ago. Skynyrd was part of my youth’s broad musical tapestry and his passing brings that period and their songs to mind. The Neurons selected a humorous song from 1973 for the morning mental music stream, “Gimme Three Steps”. Song is derived from a true story which happened to a band member.

Okay, coffee is at hand. Stay pos. This is Wednesday. Act like you own it. Like you got dreams and you’re gettin’ after ’em. Time to do it. (A phrase which encouraged The Neurons to kick in a song by the Black Eye Peas, “I Got A Feelin'”.)

Here’s a terrific live version of “Gimme Three Steps” from ’76. Cheers

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Monday’s Theme Music

They told us it would be snowing again on Monday morning, but wow. Sunshine is splashing the land like champagne at a championship celebration. I’m digging it. So are the purr beasts.

Temperature, we’re looking at 42 F, up from overnight stays at 26. 42, the weather theorists say, will be our high today. This glorious sun entered the scene at 6:38 and sunset will come at 6:07 on the PM end. Not bad for Monday, March 6, 2023.

I’ve been reading/writing, assisting spouse with house-cleaning needs. She’s hosting her book club this month. Originally known as ‘The Number One Ladies’ Book Club’, inspired by the set of novels they were reading at that time, they don’t go by that name any longer. They’re just the book club.

Everything presented to the public has been cleaned for the book gathering. I am not permitted to be present. Standard rule across all the households. Members only, and they’ve decided, for purposes of dynamics, to keep it female only. New members ask to join and that’s thoroughly debated as the candidate is vetted. They’ve been doing this for fifteen years, I think. They rotate roles. Each month, one serves as host, another is moderator, and a third selected the book. These roles are established by requests, volunteering, discussing, and voting in December. Several original members have dropped out or moved away. One member passed away. Cancer. Don’t know what their median age is, but the cast includes retired accountants, teachers, nurses, administrators, and fitness instructors. The book club cooking phase will commence tomorrow. The meeting is Wednesday. They meet once a month.

I do get to participate vicariously through discussions with my wife as she reads and thinks about the books and researches the authors. I’ll read many of the books as well as the discussions draw me in.

An off-the-cuff remark to my spouse excited The Neurons. They responded with thoughts and music about Pandora’s Box. With a little mental dithering, I addressed the two different pop songs I know by that name. They’re wholly different. The Aerosmith version was released in 1974, and it’s a raunchy rocker. Procol Harum’s piece followed a year later, and as expected, takes a little more cerebral approach. I’ll include both today, and you can decide works as your Monday theme music.

Coffee is being enjoyed as I type. Stay positive and use your day as best as you can. Don’t be one of those who sit back at the end and say, “Well, I wasted that day.” Never a good feeling. Sometimes happens, but I try to avoid it if I can.

Here are the tunes. Cheers

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Sunday’s Theme Music

Heavy snow fell this morning for thirty minutes. Thick mythological flakes twirled and spun, building to a fast two inches. But the temperature was 36 and the sun cracked the clouds, and lo’, it melted in minutes. Now it’s wintingery again, dashing dark clouds, determined sunshine, uncertain winds chasing leaves.

It’s Feb 26, 2023, a Sunday. Sun’s warm light surmounted the southeasterly elevations at 6:51 this morning. We’ll stay in its presence until 5:57 PM.

Winter warnings are issued. The weather nerds say snow and rain every other day this week. Highs in the 40s to 50s during the day but pushing the mercury down in the mid-twenties at night. Last night’s low was 28 F. It’s now 42, which is our high.

Interesting news from sis-in-law. One, QVC is talking about a deal with her for her product, the CranioCradle. Two, she was in a car accident and now has a bad hip and can’t walk. They’re telling her she’ll probably need surgery. Her insurance company is taking care of everything, and she has Medicare to cover other costs. Still, it’s a pain.

We were out shopping in the changing conditions. — had to – Book Club in March, you know, K is hosting, you know — apparently the President and significant royalty from around the world is showing up, to judge from the planning and preparation — and I somehow between the axis of K’s zealous planning and the changing wintingery situation ended up with The Neurons plugging “Shelter from the Storm”. Guy named Bob Dylan sung it originally. Came out on one of his albums in the 1970s.

Stay pos. The shopping expedition flushed my energy away. It’s a lot of tedious standing around for me. It was just raining, then sleet, then snow. Now it’s sunny. The wind has gone on up the road. Monday is coming.

Here’s the music. Have a magnifico Sunday. Cheers

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Sacrifice

She brought me a small white plate.

Two dark pieces nestle on it. I stare at them, then shift the stare to her.

I had been smelling them since I came into the house after my coffee house writing session. Chocolate.

K is on a diet. Today is day 30. She is allowed to add one thing today. She added vegan honey to her breakfast amaranth. Now she waits three days to see if there’s a reaction. If a reaction — pain, a flare, stiffness — is experienced, that item is banned from her diet. Forever. Then she resets for a few days and adds another item. If no reaction is felt, she adds another item and waits three days. So it goes.

This means that she can’t eat what’s on the plate.

She’s hosting book club next month. The moderator opted for something lighter for March. Lessons in Chemistry. Bonnie Garmus. Kay is making vegan brownies studded with chocolate chips. These are vegan chips from Trader Joe’s. Vegan butter was used. This is a test batch. A Ghirardelli mix was used.

“Taste these,” she tells me. “Tell me what you think.”

She can’t have them. Diet. Two of the Ashlandians in the book club are vegan.

I force myself to eat a chewy, gooey vegan brownie.

“Wonderful chocolate taste. Not too sweet. Greasy,” I announce. That makes sense to her. There was something about the vegan butter melting and then measuring it again. She didn’t do that. “And they’re not done enough.”

“Five more minutes?”

“Maybe just three.”

She nods. She’ll make another test batch this week.

They go great with black coffee on a winting Ashlandia afternoon. An entire tray waits for me in the kitchen.

I’ll need to pace myself or it might be death by chocolate.

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Saturday’s Theme Music

Good day, Saturheads. Today is December 4, 2021. Happy birthday to you, if it’s your birthday. Hope it’s the best one yet.

Day broke with a foggy layer. Appears to be yesterday’s fog, as the day decided not to change its weather, but to just use yesterday’s weather. “It was barely used yesterday,” the day was quoted on the net (so you know it must be true). “It just hung in the sky all day. Still looked brand new. So, what the cloud? I figured I’d economize, use it again. You have any idea how much it costs to put up that much new fog every day?”

Yesterday’s highs were never achieved as fog shut down the sun’s heat. We mustered 50, I think. Expect the same today. Currently 41 F six hours after starting at 39 when the sun stumbled in at 7:23 AM. I bout it will be much warmer by the time the sun bids adieu at 4:39 later this afternoon, just three hours from now.

Been out shopping. Visited Scoffco as Costco is now labeled for the preponderance of mask scoffers. They’re not worried about catching nor spreading no stinkin’ COVID. That location was the worse of the seven stores we visited this morning. Seven? Yes. My wife has begun collecting the props for her book club’s annual holiday party. (They are the Ladies #1 Book Club.) We were on a quest for napkins, marshmallows, and specific hot chocolate, but also did personal grocery shopping. I am the official driver and part-time advisor. “Will this work, do you think?” she asks, holding something up. “Maybe,” I sagely reply, peering at it.

Being with my wife on her shopping project, my mind adopted Lauv’s song, “I Like Me Better” (2017). She no doubt makes me a better person. Her presence helps me consider issues from the female side, and she likes challenging norms and sexism. My thinking has grudgingly expanded under her tutelage. It’s only taken five decades. That’s how long we’ve been together as friends, steadies, lovers, and spouses.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed — don’t be a Scoffco’er — and get the vax and booster when you can. Time for a coffee with a muffin, so excuse me. Back later.

Cheers

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