Welcome To The Holiday Feast

Food!

It's the season for me to write about Christmas (since I don't hide the fact that I'm a Christian).So what goes hand and hand with Christmas? Why Christmas food of course!

I enjoy cooking and baking. I find it relaxing after work. Though not everything I make for the first time turns out okay (last night was a fabulous example that when I failed at a Hungarian Chicken recepe). I have also managed to set myself on fire (it was actually an oven mit and I was okay). But all that doesn't matter because it's the holidays and everything will turn out in the end (or my family will lie to me through their teeth one of the two).

Now there are tons of different traditions for this time of year. Food is one of many. For as many Christmas eves as I can remember, I've always had my Great Aunt's Meatballs and Shrimp Scampi (yeah I know they don't sound like they belong together). Christmas was reserved for steak and occasionally ham. One of my friends' family has apples and pancakes on Christmas Eve (that was yummy). 

See very different.

Though I don't eat sweets often, I'm often amused by the sheer amount of cookies that are baked this time of year. From my mom's chocolate peppermint cookies, her lemon bars, or festive sugar cookies, there are always plenty of cookies to go around (and at least one of each kind for Santa). 

My mom also makes gingerbread at this time of year. I know most people think of gingerbread as a cookie, but she makes an actual bread. It's best right when it comes out of the oven and the butter melts as soon as you spread it on a slice.

There are so many different baked goods. I want them all.

I have a lot of found memories in kitchens (usually I am being chased out by my sister after I stole something yummy). The tastes, the smells, all of them just scream 'It's Christmas time!'. 

So I hope you guys get the opportunity for some holiday cheer along with cookies and hot chocolate. Make sure the Grinch doesn't steal your rare who roast beef and the last can of who hash. I'm going to make dinner now. 

If you enjoyed this post please like, share or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and hope you enjoy reading about my misadventures once a week.

Until next week.

Welcome To Cosmic Wonder & Broken TVs

Universe, you and I need to have a little talk. Now I get that the end of the year is coming up and you might have a quota on messing with the lives of certain people, but did you have to cause my (roughly) 15 year old analog TV to drop dead? Don't you understand that I don't need any more stress (or for that matter expenses) right now?

You don't care?

Go figure.

Yeah, that's right my TV died. It was a real battle of wits for a while between me keeping it on and it turning off by itself. It made me realize how grateful I was to even be given a (really old, but loving) TV when I moved in to my first apartment.

In fact this whole time of year tends to make me feel a bit more grateful for everything. I have a roof over my head, a loving (but somewhat insane) family, friends who I can count on, food on the table and a job. I don't actually need the TV.
This weekend, my dad, sister and I headed to Williamsburg for Christmas Town at Buschgardens. It was beautiful. Everything was decked out in lights. I especially loved taking the train around the park.

My sister instead that we see Santa, which we of course did. No I won't tell everyone what I asked for, but it was wonderful to see him. It certainly made me feel like a little kid again. It was my favorite part of the trip.

There were a ton of little kids in line with us to meet Santa. Some of them would write letters and put them in a mail box for later. Though one tiny girl did start crying when she was put on Santa's lap (it was a little funny).

Now you might be wondering if I still believe in Santa. I do. My family has always believed in the jolly elf and spoken of him as a real being. Therefore I believe he's real.

So even though I was all worked up about my TV breaking, seeing Santa again made me remember that that wasn't what was important. Spending time with my family and having a great time was.

If you enjoyed this post, or it really pissed you off, please like, share and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and hope you enjoy hearing from me.

Until next week.

Welcome To Christmas Cheer

No One Seems To Have It Anymore...

First I would like to say that the “Hobbit the Desolation of Smaug” was great and I highly recommend it. Second, I am watching Psych: The Musical and it is amazing. I think I might laugh my butt off. Please tune in as soon as possible. I wonder how often they will reshow this episode.

So it is ten days to Christmas. Yes Christmas, a holiday recognized by Christians as the birth of their savior and everyone else a huge financial head ache. I am (did I not mention this before) a Christian, though I do have my issues (cough Saint Paul cough cough). I have set up my Christmas tree with Harry Potter Legos (copyright Lego) surrounding the base. I have my advent wreath in the center of my dining room card table. I helped pick out the trees for my parents house. I saw the children’s Christmas Play at the church I grew up in today. I am definitely feeling the holiday spirit. 

A white Christmas is not on my list of desires this holiday season. I have already had two snow falls this December. I did not enjoy either. One encased my cute little car in two inches worth of ice. It took me twenty minutes to dig it out and defrost it. I was unhappy and almost late to work. Therefore snow should only fall on the weekends and melt by Monday morning. I command it and therefore it must be so (I wish that was how it worked). 

Other than discovering that snow is evil during the work week (as well as loosing email access while working from home, but that is another story) I discovered that people actually believe that Santa and Jesus were both “white”. If anyone saw John Stewart (one of my idols) you would have seen his piece on Fox News talking about why Santa and Jesus were “factually” white. I literally burst out laughing. Factually Jesus was a Middle Eastern Jew. Unless the Middle East suddenly moved geologic locations and have a very demographic than I learned in Model United Nations then he was definitely not white. Also Santa, or Saint Nicholas if we have to be specific, was from Turkey, not Greece (okay technically it was Greek occupied Turkey, but in modern times it is Turkey). I have officially lost all respect for anyone who has not realized this (mostly Jesus, I can kind of understand the ignorance around Santa due to media stereotypes).  

I shouldn’t rant. I really shouldn’t, but it is sometimes so hard not to. I could probably rant an entire one person play about how bad Maryland driving is and how to correct it. 

Christmas time used to be so magical for me. All the music, the lights and the happy memories were great. I loved it. Now I’m actually kind of sick of it. They play all of the same songs over and over again on the radio. People are going out of their way to make our society dumber (or point out the idiocy in our society). I am just not feeling it anymore. Maybe I will start feeling the spirit again once it gets a little closer to the “Big Day”. 

Happy Holidays everyone and yes it is Holidays. I believe New Years, The Winter Solstice and Kwanzaa all qualify as Holidays at this time of year along with Christmas. I celebrate at least two of those listed on top of Christmas. 

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off) please leave a comment or share it with your friends, family and / or enemies. I am going back to the musical Psych. Until next week.