Toasting Strudel welcomes you in to a POST HOLIDAY FUCKIN WONDERLAND.

Well! It is January again. I was thinking there would be Polar Bear dippery by my people again on New Year’s Day, but much to my amusement it was completely forgotten about until midday. Whoops. I was in bed before midnight, but at 12 there were fireworks and gunshots. A friend made me feel better later by gently suggesting they were firing blanks. I was refreshed on New Year’s and not at all hungover or underslept.

The same could not be said for Xmas day. I had my sister over for dinner and stayed up waaaay too late watching The Big Lebowski, which is Morgan’s favorite of all time. It’s safe to say the Dude blew Franny’s mind. “This is the coolest movie I’ve ever seen,” she said reverentially, as if some secret had finally been revealed.

Franny and I popped out after present opening on Xmas morning to see Les Miz. I saw Les Miz for the first time when I was 13. I tend to agree that you may be more vulnerable to being hooked by it if you’re a teen girl. We got to sit side by side in the theatre, crying silently and sharing a pack of tissues. By Xmas night I was really sick–my immune system’s tipping point is often when I’ve had less than 6 hours of sleep and am fighting it off.

Something funny happened on the way in to the movie. We were one of the first people in to the lobby and had come almost an hour early for the 11 a.m. showing. I figured it would be full of the die-hard since it opened on Xmas Day, and that was the first showing (other than the midnight opening the night before). We made our way up to the fourth floor of the googleplex and I said, “Let’s get seats now and snacks later.” Franny agreed with me. As I passed concessions, I could see a man and a woman standing there, waiting for popcorn. The woman turned her head towards us and a group of two other ladies and I could see her eyes pop wide in horror. Someone was going to beat her in! Our theatre was really close to concessions and I could hear her RUNNING up behind us, but would not elbow past us. Franny and I got the front and center seats on the raised tier, which I think are the best seats. I could see the shoulders of the woman behind us visibly sag as we sat down. She and her companion sat close to us and were very polite and said nothing to us. I pretended I didn’t see her silent drama, since I didn’t want to tussle over the seats, but hey, I am a superfan too.

I took a week and a half or so off through the holidays so I could hang out with the girls and bake and play with the Wii. Not much happened, which was awesome, except my lawyer finally decided to properly fire our guardian ad litem. The trial is now pushed out four months, since we will need a new one to assess us.

I did a lot of cooking for my sister’s visit. I considered making some kind of sumptuous yule log, but I got a wild hair and decided to make four kinds of dessert: apricot, blackberry, and strawberry pâtes de fruits, brandied fruit tarts, peanut brittle, and to put out my scotch truffles.

P. got involved since he wanted to make gingerbears. The recipe turned out a little oddly–they swelled and puffed more than gingerbread should, but they tasted nice.

Franny thought they looked a little pedobear. It was fun to eat their heads.

Here’s the table all set before the devouring began. I set out potted “hare” and quince jelly.

In between all this I kind of rested up and was pathetic, like everyone else in Seattle. I swear everyone got this cold. Franny left on the 26th. Then I started cooking again.

A craving for non-sucky Moroccan led me to get my own checkstub. And buy rosewater. And isn’t the bottle pretty?

P. made a pattern in parchment for cinnamon. A cinnamon snowflake.

Bastilla!

The table is laid again:

Today Franny is coming back early. Today has been deadly boring, which is pretty awesome. Her early return has been happening almost every weekend for the past little while. It’s nice–I miss my kid who will correct my middle finger from the generic old man flip off into something with flair.

One

Last night I watched Tim Burton’s Batman with Franny and Strudel. Franny drank a ton of water and could not wait any longer–she had to run to the bathroom.

“What happened?” she said when she came back. The Joker had just abducted Vicky Vale and Batman had just crashed his car on the steps of the ridiculous cathedral thing the movie ends in.

“Oh,” I said. Was this really happening to me? I had only read about these kinds of setups. “The Batmobile lost its wheel and the Joker got away.”

No one even blinked!

Two

This morning I was picking up so I could dust my messy house and sweep the edges where Neato doesn’t go, when I noticed Strudel shoving Horace slightly. She does this sometimes when he sits on or near her, like she is trying to shoo him subtly. I know she likes the dog, and I never see her being outright mean to him, but I don’t understand this one. I think it’s one of the many mysteries of Strudeldom.

“Quit shoving the dog,” I said, as I folded blankets that were abandoned on the couch.

“Why?”

“Why? Because I will fire you if you don’t,” I pulled out of my butt.

“What’s that like?” she asked, very interested.

“Well, I will point at you like this,” I pointed at her in my most Trumpian fashion, “and I will say ‘YOU’RE FIRED’ and you will have to find a new home that has an opening for a seven-year-old who is NAUGHTY.”

“Do I have to go live in an alley?” she asked.

“No, you go live in a home for unemployed children. They have a couple downtown. You get weekly unemployment candy while you search for a new home.”

“UnemPLOYment candy? That sounds pretty good.”

“You’d think so, but it’s only 60% of your normal weekly candy, and you have to prove you’re searching for new parents to keep getting it. In the meantime I will be interviewing a few children candidates to fill your vacancy.”

“Are the children in the home nice?”

“Well, generally speaking, unemployed children are pretty angry.”

“Nice doggie!” she said, and petted Horace gently.

THREE

Fangsiving! Was weird this year! Not like weird bad. I just realized the only pictures I took were of the chickens in the backyard but everything came out really well, I think. I did a dry brine on the turkey instead of my typical brine bath and then kind of freaked out at the last minute and did the usual breast-covering with a cheesecloth soaked in butter and wine. AND THEN, since I am so clever I had a sandwich at like 1 a.m. and left all the turkey out on the counter, inelegantly solving the hair-pullery which is O what shall we do with the leftover turkey. Answer: spoil it.

I was having a lot of thoughts about how much I love Thanksgiving and yet it is this pageant of…not femininity, since a lot of men cook too, but this really elaborate display of domesticity. Then I got kind of depressed, both at these thoughts and about the idea that my brain can even try to ruin my favorite holiday for me.

I always think of my mother as I do when I think about both holidays and things that are PROBLEMATIC. She made it very clear that she did not like to cook, in general. Hamburger Accomplice was heavily employed at our house–anything to bang dinner out in 15. I could knit a flag about how terrible her cooking was and canned mushrooms and blah blah blah, but it’s pretty unsurprising from someone who is an avowed cookery-hater. When I was little we spent Thanksgiving at a grandparent’s house, and when I got older and she left my stepdad she started to make it herself. The turkey was fine, memorable only for being dry. The sides were phoned in and the stuffing was Stove Top. (This is the part where I say “But it’s okay, because it was done with love.” HA HA just kidding y’all.) The desserts were usually good because though she hated cooking she liked baking so that usually had a better result.

And yet she still went through hours of extra cooking for Thanksgiving, because even the most “button pops up when done,” prepackaged Thanksgiving takes extra time. She did it because That Is What You Do. (I have some things to say about myself and Christmas that relate to this notion as well, but I will save it for another day.) I asked myself, would I miss Thanksgiving if it was gone? Yes, certainly. Do I like the way my meals turn out? Generally speaking, I do. One year I felt my efforts were unappreciated and I boycotted the cooking and I regretted that and no one learned anything really, except new configurations in being a jerk, which is part of life too. Unsurprisingly this is from the three years that I was medium-mental from being overmedicated.

I do have a sidebar, and that is to say that I had a last-minute guest who came over an hour after they said they were coming and unfortunately, after we were done eating. Honestly, I thought they flaked and weren’t coming at all. Lately I am having experiences with hosting that are reminding me why I kind of stopped for two years in the last rental. Hand-written invitations that go ignored, etc. I’m FAR from perfect (I still owe my friend lunch for canceling a pie party after feeling overextended) but caring about etiquette used to just make me irritable but now makes me feel like an idiot, like I have missed some memo. When most people are rude and it’s okay it starts to feel like it’s my problem and maybe they are not rude? I’m still thinking. And feeling lucky that my closest friends are polite, OR have learned my etiquette foibles and are sweet to me.