On His Feets Uneven

Here it is, the Feast of Stephen, the Proto-martyr, and I am somewhat on the mend. I still haven't gone out, but I was feeling pretty great by the time I went to bed last night. So then waking up was a slow and expectorantish process this morning. Now that it's almost midday I'm back to last night's level, and might even go out for the evening meal. We've dined and supped and breakfasted on the ham from Christmas dinner, and will probably continue to lunch on it today. Someone* defined eternity as two people and a ham, but we aren't feeling that way yet. I'm sitting here listening to Sibelius—good music for frosty weather—and contemplating the delicious crunch of pickles on my ham sandwich.

William took these pictures of our house, the Corner Red Dwelling (so-christened in honor of Ursula Le Guin), on Christmas Eve with the snow coming down. And here is a better look at the Christmas table. (It's clear who's the more accomplished photographer!) I finished looking throught the photo book that I got yesterday—finished the first look through, I mean—and have be browsing in the other one (it's on Northern Mythology). No sign of two turtledoves yet.

*I found the quote attributed to Dorothy Parker, but no one has any specifics. I ran into it on Lois McMaster Bujold's MySpace blog just yesterday. Of course the title of this post is from Walt Kelly's Pogo: "Good King Stanislaus walked out/On his feets uneven" (sung to the traditional tune of the spring carol Tempus adest floridum). With that bit of trivia I come full circle to the very first blog postings I made, which must be a sign to stop this and go get that ham sandwich!

I'll Be Home for Christmas . . .(Sick)

This Christmas has been a little different. We put up our créche inside the china cabinet. I got sick beginning late last Saturday night, worsening all week. I kept putting off the final shopping in hopes I'd get better. A visit to the doctor on Tuesday let me know that it was a sinus and ear infection, and despite going on antibiotics that evening, I woke up Thursday with no voice and a painful cough and sore throat -- like fire every time I swallowed. I didn't feel like going out to breakfast with Merrill, nor was it possible to finish up the last minute shopping. To top it all off, the "unlikely" snow materialized and it snowed most of the day. So last night William went to church (he was helping with the hand-bells and singing in the choir), and I stayed home.

Today we had Christmas here, instead of going up to be with the family in Springtown. I missed them all very much, but it was a very good if quiet Christmas, as I felt better (except when I coughed). Slight exertions caused me to break into a sweat, of course. I got two neat books and a new shirt, and Christmas dinner was the ham and a pasta salad we were going to take to Springtown, plus green peas with mushrooms, mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls, and buttermilk pie for dessert. Here's a picture of what our table looked like. Susie will notice the things on the table that were Christmas presents from her, of course. The gravy boat wasn't one of them -- I wonder if they make a Spode gravy boat for Christmas (a Spode boat)?

Next week I'm off work, so I'll make a trip up to Springtown to see Dad and Peggy, and around Tarrant County to the other nephews and nieces to bring them their presents that they couldn't get today. I sure hated to miss the usual Christmas with the whole family, but our little Christmas at home was pretty good!