Bucket List – 2020

January 2, 2020January 2, 202028 Comments

It’s that time of year – in the with new Bucket List, out with the old. Let’s recap last years list (2019 link) and see how I did.

Add More Books to my Library: I added some, but not as many as the year before. Bookoutlet to the rescue again on Cyber Monday. There’s nothing quite like receiving a big box of books in the mail.

An Unwanted Guest calls for Grace not Perfection….

I didn’t buy a new bookcase, just removed the glass doors from the old one which made a big difference. (B as in Bargains, for the big Rotary Book sale is coming up in January).

Start Writing Murder Mystery: Well I started – but I didn’t continue. I wrote a rough outline during two snowstorms last winter, but it was soon abandoned because my plot was too cliché and I didn’t like my protagonists enough to want to spent a lot of time with them. Maybe a short story? Maybe a Christmas short story? Thus giving me 11 months to procrastinate…. (A because I started).

Renovate Kitchen: done and dusted, but more work than I expected. See Once Upon a Kitchen Reno link. (A plus because it went smoothly and I was happy with the end result).

The After Picture

Spend Money on Experiences versus Stuff: Tickets for everything seem to have escalated in price, so I decided to reassign the money saved from not having to pay my annual license fees to this cause. While I did do a few more things that I wouldn’t have ordinarily (Harvestfest Supper), summer theatre, the majority of the money set aside for such fun endeavors went to the electrician, who I’m sure had fun buying a new guitar for his rock band. PS. I was good at staying out of the dollar store however, except for a few new things for my kitchen cupboard. (C for effort, but needs more work/fun).

Dollarama treasure

Walk Every Day for Thirty Minutes: Who am I kidding? I failed dismally at this. It was either too hot, too cold, or too rainy. The worst wackiest weather year ever. This will be put back on this years list, as Santa brought me a warmer down-filled parka. (D minus). (edited to add: maybe I can return it -the weather has been downright balmy lately).

Host Virtual Literary Salon: This was fun and gave me a good excuse to write about books I have read recently and some older ones which made an impression on me. (see The Literary Salon under Books on my homepage for a list of the books I reviewed.) (A)

2000 Goals:

Eat More Low-Fat: get some new cookbooks and experiment with low-fat recipes – motivated by the gallbladder issues of a family member and the massive heart attack of a colleague younger than me. Making a few changes in my diet (eliminating salty snack foods and cutting down on desserts) has already made a big difference, especially in my energy level.

Exercise: maybe try something indoors like water aerobics, but then I’d have to go from the warm water into the cold air? I really need to think about this some more…

Home Renovations: redo bathroom floor (I already have the ceramic tiles, an end of the roll lot, just need to find an installer) and new window treatments (shutters or blinds?) for the two big front windows currently adorned with heavy gold drapes and pull strings. For anyone who remembers my harvest gold dishwasher, these drapes are equally ancient. They provide privacy and are in good shape but are ugly as hell, so neither Maria VonTrapp nor Scarlett O’Hara will be recycling these relics.

Buy a new camera: I’m still taking pictures with my 2005 digital camera – yes, it’s a teenager at fifteen years and like most teenagers the zoom lens is temperamental. I’ve done a fair bit of camera research, and initially wanted one which had both the LCD screen and the old-fashioned viewer lens for framing on sunny days, but it’s impossible to find one that’s not too big or too complicated, so I will probably settle for a good old Cannon point and shoot as I’m lazy when it comes to learning new technology. There’s always the cell phone camera….

Hold A Giant Garage Sale: (early June) once I get all that leftover kitchen stuff sorted out from the dungeon where I dumped it last summer.

Clean out Clothes Closets: add to garage sale. I don’t know if people have any luck selling clothes at garage sales, but when I took a pile of perfectly cute though itchy wool sweaters to the vintage store, the owner said they would sell better at a garage sale than anything he could offer me ($6 for three sweaters), so back home they went.

Sign up for Netflix: Maybe……I watch very little TV now, and am afraid I’ll be sucked into the vortex of wasting hours watching mindless shows I would otherwise never have heard of. Maybe Brit box instead? Any advice?

Write Shorter Blogs: “Yea, good luck with that.” (What’d mean, it was only 800 words?)

Happy New Years!

Free Christmas Activities for Santas and Scrooges

December 22, 2019December 22, 20198 Comments

It’s that time of year when many of us are feeling broke. Maybe we’ve spent too much on Christmas once again but the damage is done, so if you’re looking for a few free seasonal activities, or ones which require very little money, then read on.

Take in a small town Santa Claus parade, preferably one at night with lots of lights.

Christmas parade Santa Claus

I love being able to walk down to the corner of my subdivision and see our little parade. It gives you a chance to see with all the neighbors who have been hibernating inside this time of year, and later you can visit the town square for free hot chocolate and cookies. There are the same floats year after year but who cares, it’s tradition, plus Santa is the main attraction. Sure beats the city parade where you have to leave so early to get a parking spot and then stand in the cold for hours staking out your curbside space.

Splurge on a fancy specialty coffee at the mall. $5 for a Cup of Christmas Cheer, complete with burnt brown sugar topping. What a marketing tool – sign me up.

Christmas Coffee in a Cup

Verdict – a bit too sweet, but the perfect antidote to shop til you drop. Personally, I avoid the mall but some people enjoy all the last minute hustle and bustle and need the extra calories to brave the crowds.

Take in A Free Celebration of Lights Bus Tour: The city provides special transit buses for half hour tours of the lights, all for the price of a donated can of goods.

Celebration of LIghts

If you don’t have a Celebration of Lights in your area, then take a walk around your neighborhood and enjoy the twinkling displays.

Christmas Holiday Lights

Avert your eyes when you come to The Inflatable Village, (lost count after thirty), because it shines brighter than Rudolph’s nose.

Oh my nose!

Go skating. Many local arenas sponsor free family hours once the kids are out of school.

Skating Rink

Go Caroling in the Snow. Many years ago, I had a group of grade school carolers at my front door – what fun they were having! Our local paper still publishes a free carol song book, but I wonder what happens to the stacks of free copies in the grocery store now that so many people don’t read a print newspaper anymore.

No carolers in your group, then attend a church Christmas cantata or carol sing.

Carol sing notice

I’m a big fan of those old church hymns from years ago, although the last time I attended church there was folk music? Christmas Eve mass belongs to Hark the Harold Angels Sing and The First Noel, and always Joy to the World at the end. Not a church goer, dust off your old albums in the basement and crank up the vintage turntable.

Mitch Miller

Set up your traditional nativity scene, the reason for the season if you are Christian. My dad made this one back in 1950 from old barn board, long before barn board was fashionable, and my mother bought the figurines at Kresge’s dime store. The star he made in grade school always sits atop the snow on the roof.

Nativity scene

Sit in your living room and stare at your tree, or twinkly lights if you don’t have a tree, or light some candles.

Christmas tree

Open a box of Pot of Gold chocolates ($3.99 on sale), and indulge in your favorites.

Pot of Gold Chocolates

Watch your favorite classic Christmas movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, White Christmas, The Sound of Music, A Christmas Carol or all of them.

A Christmas Carol movie

Or make reading the book an annual tradition.

A Christmas Carol

Enjoy a wee small glass of port and a slice of Christmas cake late on Christmas Eve (my Irish family tradition), watch midnight mass on TV and wait for Santa to come. Track his progress on the eleven o’clock news. Merry Christmas to one and all!

santa and his reindeer

Santa’s Favorite Chocolate Cookies

December 18, 2019December 18, 201929 Comments

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is making several batches of no-bake chocolate/oatmeal/peanut butter cookies a week or two before Christmas and distributed them to all the hungry little elves who are slaving away trying to make Christmas good for everyone. They are always a crowd-pleaser at pot-lucks too. I don’t know what they are called, but I inherited the recipe from a sister-in-law back in the eighties so we refer to them as her cookies, but you could call them Santa’s favorites.

I don’t make them any other time of year, just at Christmas, although with the chocolate they would be suitable for Valentine’s Day too. It’s hard to justify the calories, but they do contain some good-for-you ingredients, like oatmeal (for lowering cholesterol), milk (source of calcium), peanut butter (for protein) and cocoa (source of antioxidants), even if there is a fair bit of sugar in the recipe. I find good old-fashioned grocery store Fry’s cocoa works best, as the one year I tried a fancy imported French brand, they were way too chocolaty, so I needed to add less. (Note: some versions of this recipe only use 1/4 cup cocoa but I’ve always used 1/3 cup of Fry’s, so you could adjust to your taste if you have a richer cocoa.)

Recipe:

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup Peanut Butter

2 cups white sugar

1/3 cup cocoa

1/2 cup milk

3 cups oatmeal (rolled minute oats)

2 tsp (10ml) vanilla

Mix sugar and cocoa in a pan. Add butter and milk and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. When it starts to boil, boil 1 to 1 1/2 minutes exactly. This is a full boil, not just a few bubbles. Do not under boil as the mixture will not set properly after you add the other ingredients.

As the chocolate mixture has to be boiled in a pan on the stove, these cookies are not suitable for kids to make. Santa’s little helpers could help measure the ingredients though.

Remove from heat and stir in vanilla, peanut butter and rolled oats in that order. I use Crunchy peanut butter as that’s what I buy, but Smooth is okay too.

Once you have added the peanut butter to the boiling chocolate mixture and whisked it through, and then added the oatmeal, you have to work quickly to scoop out the mixture before it sets. Drop by teaspoon onto wax paper or non-stick baking pans. Let cool thoroughly. Makes 24 cookies. Keep them in an airtight container. If they dry out too much after a few days, you can zap them in the microwave for ten seconds to make them moist again.

Some batches turn out drier than others, depending if I have let it boil too long, but it doesn’t affect the overall taste. It’s all good. They can be stored at room temperature or in the fridge, or frozen for later.

I usually keep a batch in the freezer and defrost when needed, even it it’s just one cookie as a treat with a cup of tea before bed. Heating them up in the microwave for about ten seconds makes them even better as there’s nothing like a warm chocolate cookie. Don’t forget to leave some out for Santa!

The Literary Salon – The Man Who Invented Christmas

December 12, 2019December 16, 201915 Comments

A Christmas Carol is one of my favorite books of all time. I love it for it’s perfect plot, it’s memorable characters and it’s simple message of hope and redemption. If you want to know the story behind the writing of this Christmas classic then this months Literary Salon selection may be for you.

I first wrote about Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol in a Dec 2017 blog where there is a link to the 68 page handwritten manuscript on view each year at the Morgan Library in New York. It’s interesting to see how many revisions he made to the original. Can you imagine Tiny Tim being called Tiny Fred? This year it is open to the page with the famous description of the foggy London street and the introduction of Scrooge in his counting-house.

Last year I blogged about A Christmas Carol as Applied to Modern Life as it struck me how many of the descriptions and themes are still applicable today.

But back to how the story came about, for don’t we always want to know where other writers get their muse.

The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits by Les Standiford

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The ultimate Christmas gift for the Dickens fan, this little book makes a great stocking stuffer!

The Publisher’s Blurb:

As uplifting as the tale of Scrooge itself, this is the story of how one writer and one book revived the signal holiday of the Western world. Just before Christmas in 1843, a debt-ridden and dispirited Charles Dickens wrote a small book he hoped would keep his creditors at bay. His publisher turned it down, so Dickens used what little money he had to put out A Christmas Carol himself. He worried it might be the end of his career as a novelist. The book immediately caused a sensation. And it breathed new life into a holiday that had fallen into disfavor, undermined by lingering Puritanism and the cold modernity of the Industrial Revolution. It was a harsh and dreary age, in desperate need of spiritual renewal, ready to embrace a book that ended with blessings for one and all. With warmth, wit, and an infusion of Christmas cheer, Les Standiford whisks us back to Victorian England, its most beloved storyteller, and the birth of the Christmas we know best. The Man Who Invented Christmas is a rich and satisfying read for Scrooges and sentimentalists alike.

Why I Liked It:

I first read Dickens in the summer of 67 when the musical Oliver came out, and believe me, at the age of eleven it was a struggle. He was so wordy if I hadn’t already known the plot from the movie it’s unlikely I would ever have attempted it, but I was madly in love with my first crush, the Artful Dodger (as played by Jack Wild who sadly later died from throat cancer) and so I persisted. I fared better in high school when I enjoyed reading A Tale of Two Cities for a book report. A Christmas Carol is a mere novella in comparison, at barely a hundred pages. Of course it helps that we have seen movie versions and theatrical performances of it too. It’s such an accepted part of the Christmas culture that we seldom think about what inspired it?

The Man Who Invented Christmas delves into how the book came to be written, including even the smallest of details like the name Ebenezer Scrooge. As well, Dickens was writing from his childhood experience of poverty as his father was frequently in debtor’s prison and he was made to work in a blacking factory at a young age to support the family. The book also provides some background context to the times, such as Tiny Tim likely suffered from rickets, a common medical condition in industrial London where smog frequently blocked sunlight and vitamins had yet to be invented. While I was familiar with much of the discussion in this book, having read Jane Smiley’s excellent (link) biography of Charles Dickens, two things stood out.

The first is the absolute genius of the plot. I can picture Dickens walking the foggy streets of London, late at night, planning it all out. Normally he would write and publish in installments, (a feat in itself leaving no room for revision), but this was to be a complete book, and for something he dashed off in a mere six weeks, writing in a manic frenzy until it was just perfect, it is a work of pure genius.

The second thing is Dickens knew when he was writing it, that it was good and possibly had the makings of greatness, although he could not have foreseen it’s enduring power, and as he mentioned in several of his letters he was quite obsessed with the process. What a wonderfully satisfying thing to be pleased with what you have written, and then to find out other people like it too. Isn’t that something we all aspire too? The reviews were all positive, glowing in fact. It never went out of print.

Les Standiford’s book is a fascinating peek behind the scenes into the mind of a creative genius and well worth a read, especially for fans of Dickens.

Postscript: Skip the movie by the same name and read the book instead. What the Dickens kind of miscasting was that? Dan Stevens will be forever known as Mathew Crawley on Downton Abbey. Any suggestions for who could play Dickens well?

Once Upon a Kitchen Reno

November 25, 201933 Comments

Once upon a time there was an old castle in need of renovation, which contained an ancient kitchen which was an eyesore to the castle inhabitant, a crotchety old woman who was never home as she was out ruling her kingdom and when she was home she seldom cooked, (although she did like to bake cookies for the neighborhood children). When the old woman retired from kingdom running she looked at the ugly kitchen and exclaimed, “Something must be done.”

The Before Picture

The original mahogany cupboards were thin and plywoody plus the U shape closed in the room from the adjoining banquet nook, and despite being custom build in the previous century, none of them were the same size. Although the Castle Owner was aware that they might qualify for the minimalist look which was back in style, she was tired of them and dreamed of something Bright and Snow-Whiteish.

The Vision:

Vision Board – Thanks Oprah!

As per her 2019 Bucket List, The Castle Owner had envisioned a new kitchen for years, and it was time for action.

The Previous Renovation Wars:

Now the old woman had been through her fair share of castle renovations, many with disastrous results and was wary of any more endeavors and in truth a bit low on gold bullion. It could even be said that she suffered from PRSD (Post Renovation Stress Disorder), which explained why the kitchen was still in it’s dreary dungeon-like state.

Years of renovating had worn her down. First there were the new windows and doors, where the installer had cut the hot water heating pipe along with the brick for the new French doors onto the deck, which required an emergency welder to be dispatched from another kingdom to fix stat on the eve of a major snowstorm. Then there was the deck, a no-maintenance castle-gray Veka with white vinyl trim, a thing of beauty from which to survey the surrounding countryside and which had come at a very reasonable price as the newly hired sales rep had underestimated many such projects and was subsequently un-hired. Unfortunately the inexperienced peasants installing, being illiterate of blueprints and such, had ignored the Do Not Dig hydro markers and plans, (in truth there was no actual reading involved just orange flags) and placed the pilings too close to the hydro line, so when the ground froze and heaved the following winter, the lights subsequently dimmed so that lanterns were required to find one’s way around the castle interior. A temporary generator was hooked up outside by the Hydro Kingdom on a cold January night and then it was up to the property owner to find someone to dig a trench under the deck so the lines could be reconnected. After interviewing NINE electricians from far and wide, most of whom were never heard from again, she finally found one who agreed to take on the job – for a price, thus turning the bargain deck into the Taj Mahal of decks. (Where were those voles when you needed them?) Then there was the roofer, a charming Jester who promised he would have his hand on every shingle, who dropped two kids off on Monday and was not seen again until Friday when he returned to do the chimney flashing leaving it in such a state as to cause continuous commentary among all the male neighbors. At 4:30 he tore out of the driveway like a bat out of hell to return the scaffolding to the rental company, never to be seen again. Then there were the twelve dead ash trees which had to be removed from the castle grounds, and the tree cutting truck which got stuck in the mud of the Ides of March who tried to remedy the situation by putting down sheets of plywood AFTER it was stuck, and the resulting fortune paid out to the landscaping company to repair and reseed the lawn. And last but not least, the new asphalt driveway, which became a moat of sorts as it wasn’t quite level near the garage so it turned into an in-ground pool for the birds every time it rained, and it rained a lot. So much that Castle Basements had to be dispatched twice to fix the water pooling in the dungeon which required more trenching.

The Research:

So the crotchety old woman (she wasn’t even that old, but this explains why she was crotchety), was battle-weary and extremely leery of taking on anything new and proceeded with extreme caution. She wasted the month of April with sessions and quotes from Ye Old Lowes and Castle Depo. Ye Old Lowes was particularly pointless as after a whole afternoon of much pencil-erasing on graft paper, it was revealed the design employee was going for training the following week. The quotes were all way too high, but more importantly they had nothing she wanted, which was old-fashioned white bead board with glass doors. (see Vision Board) Most castles now being into the minimalist look, the pickings were slim. Finally, she decided to visit the showroom of Castle Cabinets, who specialized in supplying new homes and whose kingdom had been building custom cabinets for fifty years, and there on display were the cupboards of her dreams!

After a month of consultation with the in-house kitchen designer and some tweaking, which went on for far too long as the Castle Owner was a bit of a perfectionist and indecisive too, a bad combination, which caused the designer in exasperation to repeat the mantra, “It’s whichever you prefer Joni,” a final plan was decided upon.

The blinding white cabinets of her dreams had morphed into a soft Cloud White. The mullions in the windows became plain glass, apparently mullions are out. On May 27, the contract was signed. The Castle Owner had been told six weeks and was expecting a bit of a reprieve to enjoy the nice weather, but Castle Cabinets was not terribly busy as no one could afford new castles anymore, so the installation date was set for the end of June, thus leading to three manic weeks of appliance shopping for a dishwasher, Over the Range microwave, sink, faucet, and lining up an electrician, plumber, demolition crew and lastly and with the most difficulty, a painter, a rare breed – good luck trying to find one who wasn’t booked up for months. Once found, the painter promptly did a disappearing act. He said he would get back with a quote, a week went by, many messages were left, but he finally answered one night in Ye Olde Pub (the Raptors were in playoffs, there was a party in progress in the background) and yes he’d have that quote the next day, which came and went. But eventually he agreed and squeezed her into his already hectic schedule and then he too came and went over six days, (strip wallpaper border, clean walls, sand, prime, ceiling, paint one coat, two coats). It all went well, except for a few days when he never showed up at all, but the Castle Owner, being eternally grateful to have found anyone at all, refused to nag and eventually it was done.

Selecting the paint had been an ordeal reminiscent of Goldilocks. Who knew there were so many different shades of beige. This one was too gray, this one too green, finally a Benjamin Moore employee recommended Muslin (as in the Jane Austen attire), and it was just right. The Google Kingdom confirmed it as the perfect neutral shade for a north-facing room.

The Players

The Castle Owner met many nice people during the reno. The electrician was a retired troubadour who played bass guitar in a band of merrymen and so had to leave early several times for gigs and band practice. He was there 4 or 5 days, so you get to know a bit about your royal subjects from spending so much time with them. The hydro had never been upgraded in the old castle and the circuits were not labelled and every appliance needed its own separate wiring. The plumber, well known with a gruff but efficient manner, refused all offers of brownies and sweets. He simply did not have time to eat, although he had time to critique the cute but cheap bathroom taps and the lack of a contractor. He also installed two new bathroom sinks, having located the last remaining relic in a separate kingdom, (reflected in the bill as extra travel time). The Castle Owner did not like the satin brush kitchen sink (she was expecting stainless steel as his secretary had emailed), and could a Delta faucet possibly be that expensive, but wisely kept her mouth shut. A good but reasonable plumber is hard to find. Finally, the prep work was done and by late June, the Castle Owner had been demoted from Contractor to Supervisor and Chief Baker – in addition to brownies, there was rhubarb streusel cake, strawberry shortcake and date-nut loaf to feed the hungry mob, all made in advance while she still had a stove.

As the installers did not wish to assume the liability of scratching the floor, Castle Movers were contacted to move the stove and fridge into the dining room, where the Castle Owner dined, sitting on a stool with the stove top for a table, digging utensils and plates out of boxes, the dining room table and chairs being covered with all The Kitchen Stuff. There being no stove for two and a half weeks, she ate healthy salads and microwaved dinners and happily lost several pounds.

Lean Cuisine

In the last week the kitchen cupboards were emptied (with many treks up and down the stairs to the storage dungeon, exercise is good too), revealing flower-power shelf paper not seen since Woodstock.

Yellow/orange/lime green?

The demolition went well, despite being a king’s ransom for a few hours work on a Saturday morning.

The crew was finished by 11, their donkey cart loaded for the dump, although two brownies were deducted for the snarky comment about the ancient dishwasher.

Harvest Gold or Avocado Green?

As in Shakespeare’s time (“It was the lark, the herald of the morn”), all the trades people started at an unholy hour. The Castle Owner was not a morning person but she enjoyed taking pictures of the dew on the roses and thought she might get up early more often.

Stop and smell the roses

After the demolition, there was a week of sheer madness when the painter and electrician descended to work their messy magic, resulting in the Castle Owner promptly turning into Cinderella each evening, sweeping up bits of plaster and drywall once again. But weep not lady, there was a deadline to be met.

Then came the actual installation day. All went well, but of course not on schedule and it lingered on and on as is the expected course with these things. The Castle Cabinets installer was a perfectionist but looked permanently tired as he had one-year old twins and a long commute. (Fortunately he left every day at 4 pm, which allowed the Castle Owner to take a long nap – like Sleeping Beauty reposing on the couch,the smell of sawdust didn’t disturb her at all so soundly did she sleep). The doors weren’t spray painted on time and required another visit the following week. The broom closet turned into pantry shelves did not line up and needed to be re-cut. One piece of floor molding did not match and had to be redone then resprayed.

The Big Reveal:

The After Picture

Finally, it was finished, and they all left. The castle owner breathed a big sigh of relief the first day NO ONE was scheduled to come and she had her house to herself again and could sleep late and drink her coffee and check her emails in her PJ’s without the sound of pounding or drilling. Except then she had to cart all the kitchen stuff back up from the dungeon and place it in the new cupboards. A whole afternoon was spend looking for the perfect matching shelf paper, and then another with measuring and cutting it. She tried to channel Marie Kondo and place only those items which were useful and which sparked joy back in the cupboards. She was amazed at how cluttered her cupboards had been before, and how simple they looked now, with the aid of a few new accessories from Dollarama.

Dollarama treasure

She was also amazed by how much stuff she had that was never used. She tried to sort through it all, putting things aside for the Goodwill or a garage sale (the gold coffers needed replenishing and that $35 once used French press coffee machine might bring in a few coins), but by late July she said, “the hell with this” and threw the rest of the boxes back down in the dungeon where they would sit until some frosty day in January. There was still six weeks of summer left to enjoy.

Overall the Castle Owner was satisfied with the way it all turned out. Even the things she had dithered over for weeks, like the hardware pulls and the laminate, looked good.

She wasn’t sure how her red accessories/curtains/rugs would go with the new look, but they were fine and saved the added expense of buying new ones right away. Even the red and blue dishes blended well together.

Unlike some of her previous projects, (see Renovation Wars) she was pleased with the trades she had hired. They were all nice and trustworthy professionals. (Trades are in such short supply in this part of the kingdom, we should be encouraging more young people to consider them).

The Castle Owner lived happily ever after in her new kitchen – except now everyone wanted to see her new domain and she was expected to cook more – for there can be no better excuse to entertain than a new kitchen – Gobble, Gobble. Happy Thanksgiving from my kitchen to yours!

Some Bits of Advice:

Unless you have a contractor, or a plumber, electrician and painter lined up, allow yourself plenty of time between signing on the dotted line and the actual installation date, because all these trades are super-busy. I was extremely lucky and used references from people I knew who had been through a reno themselves. The plumber was frankly horrified that I had not hired a contractor, but I didn’t think I needed one – it was just kitchen cupboards, could it be that big a deal? Yes it was, and it wasn’t like I was even tearing down any walls – although I wish I could have, I had to work with the small space available. Line up as much of the other stuff (appliances, hardware, paint) ahead of time if you can, unless you want to spend a crazy stress filled month like I did.

One of the most frustrating things was picking out the paint as I had expected to paint after the installation, not the week before. How do you decide what color to use if you don’t know how it’s going to look? In retrospect a darker wall color might have contrasted better with the light cupboards, but I grew frustrated with all the graige (gray-beige) samples which matched the the laminate in the store but not in the room, and opted for safe and neutral. I painted the bulkheads the same Cloud White as the cupboards so they would not stand out.

Don’t be afraid to change your mind. I had carried around the idea of a blue and white kitchen in my head for years but practically I knew bright-white would not go as well in my house which is mostly beige and warm tone wood. I even gave in on the clear glass cupboards and am happy with them, as the smallish cupboards would have been too cluttered for mullions.

Don’t stress too much about mistakes. While I was happy with everything, except for the brushed satin kitchen sink, after awhile the mistakes didn’t bother me as much. I can always buy a new sink at Lowes if this one doesn’t stand up. In other words, don’t sweat the small stuff. On the other hand, if something really bothers you, don’t be afraid to speak up – it’s your money.

Do lots of research and budget wisely. You don’t have to spend a fortune on a new kitchen, unless of course you want to. Some of the quotes I got were crazy…..as well as ugly. My small kitchen came in under budget for the custom-built cupboards with another $5000 or so for the trades/paint/appliances etc. I did run over on the trades as my hydro had never been updated. I still have to upgrade my fridge and stove to stainless steel, but frugal me hates to give up my old faithful Maytags for those electronic models which barely last five years. (I obviously jinxed things as the fridge is now making strange noises so I may be hitting the Black Friday sales this week). The OTR microwave is also great and frees up counter-top space. I’m happy to have a dishwasher again and am using it more than I thought I would.

They wisely left me room for a bigger fridge with small cupboards above, which are basically inaccessible so therein resides seldom used items such as my liquor supply, one lonely bottle of rum for the Christmas cake.

Laminate has improved and is now a popular choice again. It came with my package so I chose the best of what they had and although I wondered if it was a bit too busy, my choice (Spring Carnival) pulled the gray of the stainless steel and the beige of the wood floor together. I had decided if I didn’t like it I could always upgrade later but as well as the extra $5000 for granite or quartz it would have added another three weeks to an already drawn out six-week process, plus travelling to a city an hour away to pick out a slab, another set of installers etc. Be realistic about what your investment will return when you go to sell your house. For me, trying to avoid trendy stuff was important and the classic farm-house look went with my older cottage style home.

Removing the one wall of cabinets opened up the space to the dinette but now my old table doesn’t match. I draped my grandmothers lace tablecloth over it to hide it, but wonder if I should move my beige and and oak dining room table in there, although it’s really too big for the space. I’ll live with it for awhile and decide later, always a wise option.

I’m very happy with the two Lazy Susans, even though at just nine inches they were a tight squeeze in the corners, and the pull-out shelves in the pantry, the best invention ever, and also the large drawer for pots and pans. Splurging on these small things made everything very functional and efficient and did not add that much to the cost. The designer talked me into using pulls on the glass cupboards instead of pretty knobs, so as not to mark up the new cupboards when your hands are messy from cooking, a practical tip I had not thought of. Because a kitchen isn’t just for show, it’s to cook in too!

Of course, renovating one area, makes the rest of your house look old and tired. I have to tackle window treatments next – I’m thinking shutters if they are not too expensive for those big front windows – really a house is just a money pit!

I was happy when it was over, and wished I had done it sooner, but never again. Two conflicting thoughts – but anyone who has ever done a kitchen renovation will know what I mean!

PS. Do you have any renovation stories/nightmares you wish to share?

The Literary Salon – A Modern Gothic Mystery

November 14, 2019November 15, 201925 Comments

“It’s a dark and stormy night….the November winds are howling around the house as the last of the leaves go scurrying across the yard. Inside, all is silent except for the sound of sleet pinging against the window. It will be snow tomorrow.”

Thus reads my journal entry for last weekend. We had eight inches of snow on Monday, Veteran’s Day, a record for this early in the season. It was the perfect day to snuggle inside and read a good book, preferably one with lots of atmosphere.

Gothic mystery is heavy on atmosphere – there’s always a haunted house with a dark history, a slightly sinister caretaker, an unexplained murder or two and some ghostly phenomena to set the proper tone of creepy ambiance. Add in a determined but solitary heroine who confronts terror head on, and a dash of potential romance with a male of the strong and silent type, and the genre is complete. Dauphne du Mauier’s Rebecca, Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, and Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights set the bar high for this standard. But if you want a modern update on the Gothic mystery then Ruth Ware’s latest book, The Turn of the Key, provides a modern twist – a haunted house with Smart technology set on the windswept Scottish moors…but maybe it’s not a good idea to be too Smart.

The Publishers Blurb:

When she stumbles across the ad, she’s looking for something else completely. But it seems like too good an opportunity to miss—a live-in nannying post, with a staggeringly generous salary. And when Rowan Caine arrives at Heatherbrae House, she is smitten—by the luxurious “smart” home fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family.

What she doesn’t know is that she’s stepping into a nightmare—one that will end with a child dead and herself in prison awaiting trial for murder.Writing to her lawyer from prison, she struggles to explain the unraveling events that led to her incarceration. It wasn’t just the constant surveillance from the cameras installed around the house, or the malfunctioning technology that woke the household with booming music, or turned the lights off at the worst possible time. It wasn’t just the girls, who turned out to be a far cry from the immaculately behaved model children she met at her interview. It wasn’t even the way she was left alone for weeks at a time, with no adults around apart from the enigmatic handyman, Jack Grant. It was everything.

She knows she’s made mistakes. She admits that she lied to obtain the post, and that her behavior toward the children wasn’t always ideal. She’s not innocent, by any means. But, she maintains, she’s not guilty—at least not of murder. Which means someone else is.

About the Author:

Ruth Ware is an international number one bestseller. Her thrillers In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, The Lying Game and The Death of Mrs Westaway were smash hits, and she has appeared on bestseller lists around the world, including the Sunday Times and New York Times. Her books have been optioned for both film and TV, and she is published in more than 40 languages. Ruth lives near Brighton with her family. Visit http://www.ruthware.com to find out more.

Why I Liked It:

This is the third Ruth Ware book I have read, and by far her best. I blogged about The Death of Mrs. Westaway in last years post A Gothic Read for Halloween. While I enjoyed that book, it took over a hundred pages to establish the protagonist as young, poor and alone, although she did an excellent job of describing what it’s like to live never knowing where your next meal is coming from. While The Woman in Cabin Ten was more of a psychological thriller, her last two books rely on the haunted mansion theme to supply the needed atmosphere. Her first book, In a Dark Dark Wood, was my least favorite but they were all good reads. I do love it when I discover a new author and find she churns out a new book every year that I know in advance will be good. So often I pick up a promising thriller in the library, start into it and then abandon it from sheer boredom.

The Turn of the Key is told in first person, which is not my favorite, being so limited in scope, but somehow it works. The young protagonist isn’t even all that likable, as many of her heroines aren’t, and they’re not always the brightest either. If someone offered you a nanny position with high pay, but you knew the four previous nannies had quit, would you take it on? You would if you were poor and struggling….and had another reason. Scotland seems a popular locale for books these days but there isn’t even that much about it in the book. At the center is the house with its modern Smart technology – the owners are IT/tech specialists who travel extensively (thus the need for the nanny), so the house is equipped with all the bells and whistles to control everything from lighting to music to locks. Well, someone is controlling it….

The annual hospital lottery Dream Home in my neck of the woods is equipped with all the latest technology, and although I intend to buy a ticket I’m not sure I would want to live in such a place. It creeps me out knowing that Smart TVs and Alexa are listening in on our conversations, but perhaps I am too old-fashioned and you grow used to all these modern devices and wonder how you ever lived without them. I’ve noticed that many of the protagonists in her books tend to have a wee bit of a drinking problem. This is a plot device which started with The Girl on the Train but the fuzzy alcoholic memory thing has been overdone IMO. Or perhaps it is just a reflection of the popularity of binge drinking among young women. I don’t know, we never had the money or the inclination for that type of recreation. (Note – the protagonist in The Woman in Cabin Ten is drunk throughout the whole cruise). Other than that small criticism, the plot here is nicely revealed and the ending well done although perplexing in some ways. Technology is great but it can sometimes make life more complicated. Perhaps there’s something to be said for old haunted houses full of ghosts who aren’t too Smart….

They Shall Not Grow Old – a WW1 Documentary

November 9, 2019November 16, 201919 Comments

They Shall Not Grow Old is a 2018 documentary produced by Peter Jackson which debuted last year on the BBC on the 100^th anniversary of the Armistice of November 11 1918. Now available for viewing in North America, the film was created using original WW1 footage from the Imperial War Museum’s archives. Most of the video has been colorized and transformed with modern techniques and sound effects to better reveal the soldier’s experiences, rather than the sped up blurred clips of vintage newsreels. Intended to be an immersive experience of “what it was like to be a soldier”, the film crew reviewed 100 hours of original film footage and 600 hours of interviews from over 200 veterans to make the film, including audio from 120 of them talking about their war memories. The director Peter Jackson, dedicated the film to his British paternal grandfather who fought in the war. The title was inspired by the line, “They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old” from the 1914 poem, “For the Fallen” by Laurence Binyon, which is often quoted on Remembrance Day, especially the famous fourth stanza. The poem was written in Sept 1914 in the early days of the war when the first deaths were being reported…..there would be millions to follow.

The Movie Trailer

Note: I have not actually seen the movie yet, but have it on reserve at the library. (Edited to add – it was powerful and moving to watch these young men go off to war as if on a grand adventure and to see the actual footage of the sad reality – I really have no words.)

I have blogged before about my Uncle Charlie WW1 Vet. Like many of his generation, he never talked about his war experiences, other than being gassed and convalescing for six months with the Spanish Flu before being shipped home, but I have tried to reconstruct his war journey through his WW1 memorabilia. (link – Uncle Charlie WW1 Vet)

Being the faithful library patron that I am, the staff requested one of my mother’s paintings (above) for their Remembrance Day display. I spied this book on the shelf and skimmed through it. It’s quite gruesome in parts, so not for the faint of heart – but that is the reality of war.

A Broken World: Letters, Diaries and Memories of the Great War by Sebastian Faulks

A collection of of personal WW1 diaries and letters, this book is an an unforgettable read for history lovers. Lest We Forget.

For the Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

Welcome to Downton – A Movie Theatre Review

October 29, 2019October 29, 201930 Comments

At the risk of sounding like an old fogy, it’s been years since I visited a movie theatre – 22 to be exact – the last movie I saw at “the show” as we used to call it, was Titanic. Yes, the year was 1997 and those actors are now middle-aged. There hasn’t been a movie since where I felt I could not wait the minimal few months for it to come out on DVD, or it isn’t even called that anymore – become “available for home theatre viewing.”

So it was with much anticipation that I awaited the opening of the new Downtown Abbey movie. For stalwart fans of the Masterpiece TV series it was like coming home again, for it’s been three long years since we last had a glimpse of the Crawley family and their downstairs servants. (See my Febrary post – Downton Abbey Revisited for more on their famous world. Ah, the food, the fun, the fashions….)

The old Cineplex theatre where Titanic last sailed, has been torn down and a new multiplex Cineplex built, as that was the most requested addition according to a recent mall survey. As the average box-office movie-goer is now a teenage boy who is into Marvel/Star wars movies, that’s probably who they surveyed. No one I know goes to the movies anymore, so we have only ourselves to blame for the dearth of watchable movies.

We decided to attend the noon matinee on the opening weekend, thinking the crowds would be fewer, and they were as when we walked in there were maybe fifty people at most. The set-up reminded me of an IMAX theatre, an enormous screen with the seats facing downwards, but at least no one could obstruct your view. I remember the last time I was in an IMAX theatre, decades ago for a Grand Canyon documentary, definitely not a good idea for someone who doesn’t like heights. Speaking of heights, I wondered why almost everyone was sitting near the top. We soon found out, as wow – that surround sound is certainly loud. Even my mother, who denies being a bit deaf, thought it was way too loud. As she was unable to climb higher than five rows up we stopped there, and had a lovely conversation with the lady in the seat behind us, who had recently had knee surgery and also found the stairs a chore. Although there was a space below to store her walker, these places are really not designed for the handicapped…..steep uneven stairs, a long reach to the side handrail, and an elevation requiring a sherpa to achieve. I watched the people coming down afterwards, mostly an older crowd, and everyone was navigating slowly as if coming down off Mount Everest.

The seats were fake leather, non-tilting and horribly uncomfortable – gaming chairs really. They must have surveyed their 15 year old target audience.

The lights dimmed – therein followed thirty minutes of previews – lots of dark intergalactic forces at work on the planet these days, plus one unappealing Christmas rom-com staring nobody I knew. I didn’t know they still made rom-coms, but Meg Ryan would not be caught dead in a silly green velvet elf suit. The only one I was remotely interested in was Judy, and I can easily wait the three months to see Renee Zellweger as Judy Garland, which I’m sure will be an Oscar-worthy performance. Most younger people would not even know who Judy Garland was, nor maybe Renee Zellweger either.

At least ticket prices are still reasonable…..$9 for a senior and $11 regular. Big boxes of popcorn were $9 but small ones were $7 so you might as well spring for the larger size. And what a variety of hot foods available, my lord – poutine at the movie theatre? I happen to think poutine is a code word for future heart attack, but hey the target audience is invincible.

Oh yea….I was supposed to be reviewing the movie.

The Movie: (no spoilers here)

There’s a big difference between writing a weekly series with an ongoing storyline and having to construct one from scratch in such a way that people tuning in for the first time are not hopelessly lost. There were lots of intro scenes establishing the background and introducing the characters. This probably accounted for the slow first half – I glanced over and my mother had fallen asleep, (1:30 pm is her usual nap time), but when I nudged her awake, she said she was just resting her eyes. My eyes were sore too, as I found the screen way too close even from five rows in the midsection and wished we were higher up the mountain. Where is a sherpa when you need one….

The characters seemed somewhat subdued. It took them awhile to don their familiar roles, which is to be expected I suppose as when you are playing someone weekly it’s easy to slip into character again. They were rusty – not Mary or Violet though. Although everyone had a story, some were larger – Mary, Tom, Thomas and Daisy. Daisy really seemed to be coming into her own. Maybe they should give her a spin-off series? Some characters barely had a part – Cora, Robert and Mr. Bates, and Henry just showed up at the end leaping of a car in time for a ball, although for a tall skinny guy he does leap well. The plot line seemed thin and weak to me – but then I’m not really a monarchist. It’s hard to get too excited about a visit from the King and Queen when they couldn’t even be bothered to make an appearance the past six years – much ado about nothing – but I suppose for the time period, serving king and country and all that. Perhaps I am unfairly comparing it to the fast-paced series where scenes seldom lasted more than a minute or two and you were constantly left in suspense, wondering how things were going to turn out. This ending was preordained.

The sets and costumes were lavish as usual, as Julian Fellowes is one for details, but perhaps a wee bit less extravagant than usual. As I had read it cost 1 million pounds/dollars to film each episode of DA, I wondered if having already dismantled all the sets (except for Highclere), they had to make do. Big box movies have a budget too. If the substitute rooms didn’t seem as familiar or as opulent then maybe I have just watched too many episodes and know that the place settings would never be that close together for a formal dinner with the King and Queen, where Mosley makes a speech…..oops small spoiler. The table did seem rather crowded.

Will we get a sequel? We could – there were a few unwrapped hints, Edith’s comment about missing her job, Tom’s new romance, but I suppose it depends on how much money is made.

Most newspaper reviews have rated the movie a three star, but of course to DA fans it’s a five star. I would tend to agree with both of them. While I enjoyed it – it was good, not great. Actually, I think I enjoyed any of the two hour spectacular Christmas specials more, except of course the one where Mathew died, a tragic ending so unexpected it made some people tune out permanently. So don’t feel bad if you don’t have access to a mountain near you, you can easily wait until it comes out for home viewing…..and you can save on the popcorn too.

Overall, while it was slow to start, it picked up speed and finished with a grand, if somewhat sad, flourish – leaving us wanting more. But there’s a small part of me that wishes he had just left them frozen in time at Christmas/New Years 1926 where everything was wrapped up neatly with a big bow.

Postscript: My apologies for not commenting on anyone’s blogs this past month. Real life has interceded with the Cold-From-Hell (me), plus my mother was hospitalized for a week, she’s home now and on the mend, but I have not had internet access so I have not been able to read here at all.

The Harvestfest Supper

October 2, 2019October 2, 201924 Comments

A few weeks ago I attended a harvest-fest supper prepared entirely from locally sourced food. Such meals have become commonplace the last few years due to the popularity of the 100 miles, fields to forks, organic food movement. At $40 a ticket, it wasn’t cheap, but this annual event helps promote the local farmer’s market and also gives the community college culinary students some practical experience in food preparation and presentation. (for the book review which inspired this post – see Part One: The Literary Salon – Eating Local).

I’ve now become someone I said I never would be – one of those people who takes photos of their meal while eating and posts them online. May I be excused for the less than stellar quality of the photos, as I was so hungry that I sometimes forgot and took a few bites, plus I was trying my best to be discreet with the cell phone, although I suspect from the odd looks I received that some of my table mates thought I was a reporter for the local paper.

The Venue:

The event was held outdoors at a local farmers market, which is basically just a large slab of cement with a roof overhead but open to the elements on all sides. The first year it was held in late September and they had to bring in space heaters and put up screens to keep the wind out. After a whole week of rain, we were hoping for a warm sunny day and thankfully the weather gods smiled on us. It was actually a bit too hot, we didn’t need any of those layers I threw in the car. This was the third year for the event and the date is picked to coincide with the harvest moon, which was mid-Sept this year, and what a stunning moon it was on Friday the 13th.

Harvest Moon courtesy of the Weather Network.

The doors opened at 5 pm with a cash bar and some music playing on the sound system, as there was a band later for dancing.

They had decorated with cornstalks and large pots of mums and bales of hay around the base of the roof pillars, a festive fall touch.

The Presentation:

The presentation was well done for an outdoor event. The tables were laid with white linens and china with a red accent color in the napkins and chairs.

They even had matching party favors, as each place setting held a red candy apple with a tag promoting the October play at the local theatre, a cute idea.

There were twelve settings per table,

which was a bit too cramped in my opinion, as the meal was served family style and there was no place to set the bowls down while trying to take a portion, and those bowls were big and heavy. It was awkward.

Ten at a table might have been better, or buffet style. They really didn’t have enough servers for our table either, maybe someone had called in sick? 300 tickets were sold, and there was a big lineup of people waiting to get in when the doors opened.

The hungry mob…

I was lucky and got my tickets on a cancellation the month before, otherwise I might have been one of those scarecrows in the park across the street.

The food tents were off on the side, facing away from us, so we were not able to see any of the fast-paced cooking action like on Master Chef. The ticket price was initially only $30, but they upped it to $35 last year and $40 this year. (I imagine next year it will be $45 – as just like in an auction the price increases to what the market will bear). All of the food prepared came from the weekly farmers market, or was sourced locally within a 100 mile radius, including the beverages.

The Happy Hour

Two local craft breweries and two Ontario wineries were represented, with Pelee Island Winery just squeaking in at a 95 mile radius. It was hot, so the beer was flowing as you can see from the tabletop pictures. Unfortunately, we had a few extra guests at the table, attracted by the brew.

Uninvited guests…

The wasps descended for happy hour, stayed for the the appetizer and then suddenly departed, just as the sun was setting behind the buildings. It must have been their bedtime, or perhaps they were off to another venue (see more on the Merry Band of Wasps in last week’s blog). We sat at a table with a group of people who all knew each other, and the row across from me had to eat with the sun in their eyes. Next time we’ll know which tables get the best shade. It was so annoying that I went to the car and brought back a sunhat. I came prepared for all weather.

Now you might be wondering – why is she dragging this out, lets get to the food. I’m cleverly but somewhat cruelly procrastinating so you can imagine the whole experience of sitting and smelling the irresistible aroma of food cooking for over an hour, while constantly swatting at wasps and shielding your eyes from the setting sun, with absolutely no hope of any dinner conversation due to the din of the crowd.

Finally, the opening speeches – two political figures were there, our provincial member of parliament and our federal parliament member, (we’re having an election this fall, they need to see and be seen) and as well as introducing all the VIP’s the MC thanked the exhaustive list of sponsors. They announced they had Epi-Pens on hand if anyone got stung – medical preparedness is always appreciated. Eventually grace was said, and a proper grace it was too, fit for a Harvestfest meal, not that Bless us Our Lord standard we used to mumble when we were kids.

900 words in and not even a sign of a bread crumb…Ah, here it comes.

The butter was properly chilled, although not in those little foil packets that you sometimes get in fancy restaurants, although it didn’t stay cool long. The buns from a local bakery were good – soft and doughy. It’s a new bakery in town so I’ll have to check it out. The bread rated an A but I was starving by then so stale crackers would have rated an A.

Finally, the menu.

The Appetizer

The Garden Fresh Mixed Greens Salad with Berries and house-made Balsamic Dressing – was delightfully fresh, however the dressing was a bit too plain and vinegary. I always think this type of berry salad goes nice with a raspberry vinaigrette such as the bottled house blend I buy from a local restaurant, but then it has spoiled me for all others. There wasn’t any soup offered this year, although other years they had a choice of homemade potato or tomato. I love soup, even in summer, so I was disappointed, but still A for the appetizer.

The Main Course

A few minutes of silence while we dig in before critiquing…

The Meat

Roast Pork Loin stuffed with Apples, Spinach, Caramelized Onions and Goat Cheese.

It’s difficult for me to judge this as I’m not a big fan of pork loin. I can eat it but I’d certainly never order it in a restaurant. The traditional apple pairing was okay and I know caramelized onions are trendy, but I didn’t think they added anything special to the dish. I couldn’t see much spinach, or taste the goat cheese so they must have been subtle touches. It was served on an enormous heavy platter and although it was pre-sliced there was nowhere to set the platter down while you wrestled a piece onto your plate, so I ended up with more than I wanted. My consensus, just okay, although everyone else liked it, and the guy beside me took seconds. That’s the thing with family style, they did replenish if you wanted more. There was a short delay before they brought the rest of the meal so they were definitely struggling with the serving.

Tender Chicken Breast with a Bacon Portabello Cream Sauce.

Good old chicken, no matter how you dress it up, it’s the staple of catered meals everywhere. It was tender as promised and the Portabello cream sauce was excellent, although I couldn’t taste the bacon. (A plus).

The Sides

Yukon Gold and Sweet Potato Pave with Parmesan Cheese

I had to google to see what a Pavé was – “A flat piece of food, usually meat, cheese or bread. Pavé is French for a “cobblestone.” When used in a food context, it refers to a square or rectangular flat piece of food or dish. I guess this qualifies as it was a layered dish of potatoes cut into triangle wedges for easy serving.

It’s always a dilemma how to serve potatoes in a manner which keeps them warm but not gluey, and it was certainly a cut above a few potato puffs. It was tasty, although I didn’t notice the Parmesan cheese, but then I can’t taste the difference between Yukon Gold potatoes and regular old spuds either. As I’m Irish and never met a potato I didn’t like, I’ll give it an A, but you really can’t get too excited about potatoes.

The Vegetables:

The roasted squash was one of my favorite dishes, so flavorful. You never know with squash, it can be good or it can be bland and watery. The cauliflower and carrots were tasty too. Both were plain, not doctored up with anything, so the flavor came through – they stood on their own, a testament to good soil. (A plus).

The meat portions were generous – it was certainly a lot of food, and checking around, a fair bit of wastage, as people who had stuffed two rolls in (you know who you are), could not finish their meal. I was full but not overly so, because wisely I had saved room for my favorite part.

The Dessert

I had been craving a piece of cherry pie and had heard so much about The Famous Pie Lady.

Although the crust was good and the filling plentiful, I‘m not sure how you can make a cherry pie without sugar? There should be a law against it. It was so sour I couldn’t eat more than a few bites. As there was lots of pie leftover, I decided to try another kind when I went to refill our coffee cups, hoping no one would notice – plus it would be a shame to waste the leftover pie when things were wrapping up. There were lots of choices.

This time I grabbed a slice of apple pie. Um….interesting – apple pie with no sugar, plenty of fruit and cinnamon though. The apples mid-Sept are hardly ripe enough for pies yet, but apparently sugar is now the new evil. Maybe I’m spoiled, having grown up on a farm where homemade apple pie was a fall staple, and many people today just don’t know what good pie is. But the guy beside me was disappointed in his pie too – pecan. I didn’t ask why. Should I try the lemon meringue – no, that would be piggy, so I gave up, secure in the knowledge I had a backup plan stashed in the car. The pie was the disappointment of the evening. (C plus)

Plan B – B for Backup Dessert

Luckily I had stopped at the town’s grocery store before the event and bought a cherry pie from their in-store bakery. I’ve had it before and it’s a perfect balance of sweet and tart, and I consoled myself with the thought that if I was still craving a piece later I would cut into it, instead of freezing it like I had intended. Certainly the pie was a let-down especially for a dessert diva like me.

After Dinner Speeches

The M.C. introduced and thanked all the chefs and cooks (who came out of hiding in the side tents), raffled off an auction prize (a catered dinner for six which went for a bid of $410), thanked absolutely everyone again from the bowl makers to the man in the moon,

sorry for the tree in the way…

and then introduced the band.

The Music

The band was the house band from the local summer theatre which was currently showcasing a country music production, so they kicked off with Sold – The Grundy Valley Auction song, which is good in a cheesy way, as a cheese course is always nice after a meal. Then Bad Moon Rising (CCR) because it was by then, (see above). Then Old Time Rock and Roll – Bob Seger (okay), then they started to deteriorate into Billy Joel and two other songs I did not recognize, but then I am not up on the current stuff. The band gets an A, as they were trying for a little bit country, and a little bit rock and roll. The crowd was mostly an older one, the baby boomer set, and there were people up dancing as lots of beer had been imbibed by then. I always admire couples who are first on the dance floor, especially when it’s at the front with everyone watching. Let’s give the dancers, an A too, just like Dancing With the Stars.

Overall, it was a good meal, except for the pork and the pie, but those were influenced by my personal preferences and expectations. I had been expecting a turkey and beef dish, (as per the first year), not two white meats, plus a lot of people can’t or don’t eat pork, even though pulled pork is all the rage. Was it worth the price? Maybe. The fifty dollar per ticket meal at the swing dance last year was better, with a portion going to charity, but even it went up to $75 this year. I guess food prices are increasing overall. Did they make a profit or just cover their costs? I don’t know enough about the catering business to say. Thirty dollars, as per the first year, might have been a more reasonable price, especially in small town Ontario, considering this was not a charity event, and I expect most of the cost of the decorations, party rentals and band would have been covered or subsidized by the sponsors.

The Backup Meal

I had been craving a roast beef dinner, which I got the following week when I took my mother to the monthly seniors lunch at the same retirement home I mentioned in my Woodstock Revisited post. We had a garden fresh salad with ranch dressing, a nice tender slice of roast beer, mashed potatoes with a tasty gravy, diced turnips and a decent piece of apple pie – all for $10. The portions weren’t huge as it was for seniors, but it was enough, and they do a nice turkey dinner too, although the rest of the meals can be hit and miss. That’s the thing with restaurant reviews – a good meal may surprise you anywhere! (Hey, I wonder if I could get paid for this?)

Thus ends my short career as a restaurant reviewer. I did have a piece of that bakery cherry pie the next night, warm with vanilla ice cream, but I froze the rest. The apple in the candy apple was so sour I couldn’t eat it, but I took a few bites for nostalgia’s sake, as I’m sure it’s been fifty years since I had one the last time I went trick or treating.

It might be fun to host your own Harvest Moon Supper sometime, there’s another one coming up October 13, and the apples will be riper by then too. I think I would prefer caramel apples for the party favors, and maybe some butternut squash soup for a starter. I also saw an advertisement for a Full Moon Boat Party cruise with a band on board, which I’ll file away for next year. I’m sure they’ll be playing Neil Young’s classic – Harvest Moon.

The Literary Salon – Eating Local

October 2, 2019October 2, 201918 Comments

(This months Book Review may motivate you to eat healthier…..or you may just crave a piece of cherry pie.)

A few weeks ago I attended a Harvestfest supper prepared entirely from locally sourced food. Although I had intended this post to be a restaurant review of that meal, it grew too long so this will be the literary review for the month. The books discussed here are older ones but they inspired me to try and eat better. If you’re not into books, please feel to skip right over to the main menu. (see Part Two for The Harvestfest Supper).

Many of us have the desire to eat healthier, but in today’s fast paced world it’s becoming more difficult to do so, hence the arrival of all those companies who will conveniently, albeit for an outrageous price, send you weekly pre-measured food preparation parcels – voila, supper in 30 minutes, as if a grown person wasn’t capable of going to a grocery store, buying food and preparing it just as quickly. Perhaps there are fewer left-overs, but aren’t leftovers a good thing and would you really enjoy all those recipes they send? As well, a large percentage of debt-ridden people eat out several times a week, a major hit to the family budget, and now you don’t even have to go out as those grub-hub apps will deliver the meal right to your front door. And then there is the ever present lure of fast food restaurants so conveniently located along strip malls everywhere. No wonder we have all forgotten how to cook, or in my case never bothered much.

For many years eating local was the standard way of life. When half the population lived in a rural environment you ate what you grew or raised. My mother says that in her early married years, she only visited the grocery store for a few staples, which she bought with the $8 twice weekly cream check. My father had dairy cattle so cream, milk and butter came from the cows, meat, chicken and eggs were all raised organically on the farm, and a large fruit and vegetable garden supplied canned goods and jams over the winter. Self-sufficiency without delivery – although the breadman and milkman did make home deliveries.

Things started to change in the mid-60’s with the arrival of processed food. For an understanding of this shift in food production, I found a series of books by author, Michael Pollan to be excellent reads. His 2008 book, In Defense of Food, is famous for it’s mantra, “Eat Food, Mostly Plants. Not Too Much.” and “Don’t eat anything your grandmother wouldn’t recognize”.

In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” Simple words that changed my eating habits ten years ago when I first read this book, or at least made me stop and think first. Don’t eat anything your Grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food. Also wise words. This book provides an interesting history and peek into the multi-million dollar processed food industry – what started out as an attempt in the fifties to make food better and healthier and last longer, has backfired so that we now have transfats, plasticizers and softeners in our bread and fast food burgers which never decompose. Certainly an eye-opener – you may never eat the same way again.

The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In his 2006 book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, he discusses how food scientists thought they were improving food stability and palatability by adding chemicals and preservatives and such. And while no one would argue that organic vegetables don’t stay fresh as long and bakery bread does tend to grow mold after a few days, if you look at the long list of unpronounceable ingredients on a box or can in the grocery store, it does seem strange to want to manipulate food from it’s natural origins to a more chemical state.

Perhaps their intentions were good, and Tang orange crystals did supply the astronauts with vitamin C (although I remember it as tasting rather artificial), but starting in the 60’s the processed food revolution had begun – with snack foods, frozen TV dinners, cakes from boxes and fast food burgers – and there was simply no stopping it. It was convenient and it tasted good – who cared if it was good for you.

Like many farm women, my mother was a wonderful cook, of the plain meat/potato/vegetable type and we had plenty of homemade cakes, pies and cookies. So while I may think I grew up eating healthy nutritious meals, and most of the time I did, by the sixties we also had penny candy and weekly trips to McDonalds on grocery shopping days and Saturday night treats of potato chips and pop (usually Coke) while watching Hockey Night in Canada. Of my poor student days I have absolutely no recollection of what I ate, (did I eat?) other than residence food the first few years which was so bad I lost ten pounds. Once I had an apartment with a kitchen we still never cooked but ate cheap meals like beans on toast, (never KD though), grabbed yogurt and grilled cheese from the student cafe, and drank endless cups of mostly vile donut shop coffee. Our idea of splurging was an occasional trip to Bloor Street – Swiss Chalet (chicken), Steak and Burger (tough steak but warm apple pie) and Mr. Submarine (still the best subs IMO). When I started working I had to contend with decades of hospital food, some of which used to be quite good when it was prepared from scratch, (I remember our cafeteria serving Seafood Newburg in the early 80’s before the discovery of cholesterol), but which eventually turned into those cook, chill and reheat meals which are now standard hospital jokes – if you’re well enough to complain about the food, you can go home. I usually brought my lunch, except for the soup – as they always had some kind of homemade soup, probably loaded with salt. After I changed jobs I was often too busy to eat, and lunch would be chocolate milk or half a sandwich grabbed in the staff room, and I would arrive home at night ravenous and eat whatever was in sight. BTW, the invention of microwaves in the 80’s was a godsend, as then you could quickly reheat leftovers.

Now that I’ve thoroughly scared myself with a review of my poor dietary habits over the years, I resolve to do better. The Michael Pollan books have made a big influence on my food choices. I read food labels now. Buy as little processed stuff as I can and generally try to eat better, except for deserts, in moderation. And isn’t that the more sensible way – everything in moderation. It’s why diets don’t usually work – if you crave something, eat it, a small portion. I craved cherry pie the other day, so I had a piece and froze the rest. The French way of eating, including lots of walking, is based on this principle. As eating is one of the pleasures of life, why deprive yourself.

Recently they have changed Canada’s food guide to emphasize fewer meat and more plant sources of protein, but I wonder how practical that is – are you really going to get people to eat more tofu, legumes and nuts? It is accessible or affordable? Maybe – those vegetable burgers seem to be very popular, but aren’t they just another form of manipulated processed food, fried on the same greasy grill as the meat ones?

I’m certainly more of a foodie now than I used to be, but in moderation, not like those food network shows which drive me crazy with their pretentiousness – it’s just food folks – no need to have a melt down over a slightly burnt creme brulee when half the world is starving. But I have become more selective in my eating habits. When I eat something now I want it to be nutritious as well as delicious. As we get older we worry more about maintaining our health – and as the saying goes, you are what you eat. If you are in need of motivation – check out the books.

Enough of the discussion, on to Part Two – The Harvestfest Supper. As Julia Child used to say, “Bon Appetit”!