I am hooked on….

Any kind of green tea……
Coffee ice-cream (this empty bowl had coffee chocolate chip in in.)
Arnold Palmer ZERO icetea/lemonade…..

My two kitty cats…….

Mr. Downeastdoingstuff, of course…..

My little boy, naturally, (not so little anymore)….

Staying warm no matter what…..

Eating coffee yogurt for lunch everyday for over 25 years….

And if all else fails….

My back-up plan…..

Hey, ya gotta do what ya gotta do.

Random thoughts….

Another end to another weekend…..or as Maggie Smith on Downton Abbey asks…..

I, myself, know what a weekend is. I also know when it's over. Someday, everyday will be a weekend, but 'til then….. 
What did I do this weekend?  I continued work on a painting I started….

Saw Saving Mr. Banks, August: Osage County, the Secret Life of Walter Mitty and

Her. Liked them all.

Saw this the other day:

What could that mean?? Whatever it is, it's free.

But what is it about??

A chopper will drop something nice off?

Could be a book?

photo credit

Could be a very scary drop off?

This is Maine after all, but hunting season is over.

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Could be Nearly Headless Nick's head dropping off?

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My guess it's a joke. Yessiree. Turn the corner and see this sign up the street…that's what I think.

photo credit

ha ha ha ha ha

Hey, it's the dead of winter. We need to amuse ourselves with something, don't we?

Well, I do.

Off to work we go…….

Last couple of days….

So we got 2 snow days attached to our vacation break, making it 2 weeks off in total. Too bad we have to make those days up in June! Oh well……..

Boxed up the Christmas decorations and little by little, lugged them up into the attic. Took 2 days.

Didn't want to take all vestiges of Christmas down. Stubbornly left up the lights around the window for a while longer.

Watched a movie…..

Made bagels…..

 Made corn chowder……..

All in all, not a bad way to end a vacation. 

Corn Chowder Recipe

Ingredients

About 6 slices of bacon, chopped and cooked til crispy. Drain on paper towel, but keep fat in pan. (Remove some fat if you think it’s too much)

1/2 a large onion, diced and sauteed in the fat til soft.

1/2 salt or to taste

1/4 tsp ground black pepper or to taste.

1/4 C flour

5 C chicken stock

3 C diced or bite sized potatoes. I leave skin on.

1 can corn, drained

1 can creamed corn

1 C milk (or more if you want. OR used half and half)

1/4 pound colby cheese, shredded (or any cheese you would like)

Directions

In a large pot over medium-high heat, cook the bacon til crispy. Drain bacon on paper towel but reserve fat for the onions.  Reduce the heat to medium and add the onions to the fat and cook for about 10 minutes, until the onions are translucent.

Stir in the flour, salt, and pepper and cook for about 3 minutes.( Add some olive oil or butter if it seems there’s not enough fat. )

Add the chicken stock and potatoes, bring to a boil, and simmer uncovered for 15 minutes or more, until the potatoes are tender. 

Add the 2 cans of corn and milk/cream.

Then add cheese. Cook for 5 more minutes, until the cheese is melted.  Add bacon.

Season to taste.

Out to breakfast…..

So I'm still cuddled up with my little siamese cat in bed, trying to decide whether I should brave the cold air, when Mr. Downeastdoingstuff bounces in and announces that we should go out to breakfast.
Normally not such a big deal
Today…..well….

"What's the temperature out?", I inquire.
"Minus 17", he says.

So off we go to the Cracker Barrel.

By the time we got ready, it was much better anyway. See?

It's amazing what one gets used to. The sun was out.

Not a bad start to the day.

Day after storm…well, almost...

It's 9:10 a.m. It's up to -1 degree. And still snowing a bit. It should all be over with very soon….or so the local weather person claims.          
              Wind chills….well….see for yourself.

OK, so I lied about the -1 degree. It's actually zero now.

(Note the "feels like -21º…")  

Here are a couple of my fav birds roosting outside my kitchen window. Mourning doves. Love 'em.

They have a really hard time feeding off the bird feeders, so they ground feed under the bird feeders, but with the snow it was so hard for them. Mr. Downeastdoingstuff (aka Birdman) went out and put a tray of seeds on the ground, but the snow did quick work of it.

Window in family room. That red sliver is our garage.

Door was shut all night. This is how much snow the wind drove through the crack into our entrance hall. 

Help.

No school…..and frigid….

Snowing out, going to get worse tonight. No school and I'll be surprised if there's school tomorrow. This is tacked on to a week and a half of Christmas break, aka Winter break.

It was 1 degree this morning creating this Mondrian artwork on my kitchen window.

Winter's very pretty. :-p

Update: It's 5:30 pm and it's -3. Blizzard outside. Gonna last all night. A teacher in my school was collecting money to fight Global warming and they were doing a dip into the ocean yesterday.
Case closed.

Happy New Year! January 1, 2014

Getting ready for another storm. Catnaps all around, Christmas ambiance still up, going to bed early….back to school tomorrow. Well, maybe…..