Um

When I was driving in my car today, I thought of something to blog about. Now I can't remember what it was.

Try, try again

I've been kicking around ideas for New Year's resolutions. I may try again to establish a schedule that gives me regular, adequate hours of sleep. I've tried that before. I'm trying to remember what year I made that resolution and it just never happened. I may try again.

Not without hope

Received some expected, but sad, news tonight, of the passing of a very dear uncle.

Into your hands, Father of mercies, we commend our brother in the sure and certain hope that, together with all who have died in Christ, he will rise with him on the last day.

Yesterday

I worked today. Yesterday, Christmas Day, was a wonderful day. Here are two wonderful people.

Blessed Christmas morning

... the light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness has not overcome it.

I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas

My little great-niece sings along with this song: "Feliz Mommydad."

Increasing light

Friday was winter solstice, so now, whenever it feels dark and cold, I can tell myself every day is a little longer -- there is a little more light every day.

Sleep tight

As snug as a pug in a rug.

Iron bars a cage

I assembled the dog's new crate this morning. Last night I hauled the rather heavy box down from my car into my house.

"Step One," I said. "Get it in the house."

Then I sat on the couch.

"Step Two," I said. "Take a nap."

I slept until the wee hours, then was awake for a few hours, during which I did not assemble the crate, then slept again for some hours until slightly later than I had intended to get up.

But after walking the dog, I finally cut open the box and pulled out the crate, hoping it would not be as complicated for me as the wooden crate had been. And it wasn't. Basically, it was packaged collapsed, and you just had to unfold it and hook the pieces in a couple places.

I had bought a soft pad for the bottom. It is made for this crate but sold separately, and I put it in.



Yesterday I had put in on the couch and put some of my dog's favorite blankets on top, hoping to make it smell familiar and good to him. When I put it in the crate, he was immediately intrigued and did go halfway in to sniff, but then he backed out again. So I got his little bed out of the broken wooden crate, brushed off the wood chips, and tossed it in. Then he went all the way in.



When I leave the house in a little while, I'll put him in and shut the door. I hope it withstands whatever he does in my absence. If only he was calmer about it all.

In Richard Lovelace's poem, To Althea, from Prison, it says:

Stone walls do not a prison make
Nor iron bars a cage
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage;
If I have freedom in my love
And in my soul am free
Angels alone, that soar above
Enjoy such liberty.

If only my dog could read poetry.

The Pawshank Redemption

Yesterday, I left my dog at home while I went to work because I knew I had to go to court a couple times, and not just to hand some papers to my boss or to file documents in the clerk's office but to sit in the courtroom and wait for the proper time to talk to a judicial officer. I also thought I might work a short day. So I put the dog in the attractive wooden box I assembled for him this fall. He is not safe to let loose in the house while I'm gone because he does (ahem) inappropriate things.

As it happened, I ended up working a rather long day and, as I drove home, I felt compunction for what a long, sad day my dog must have had. I anticipated that when he heard me coming in the door his yipping and wild scratching at the door of his box would be even more frantic than usual.

I came in through the upstairs of my house and, when I opened the door at the top of the stairs, imagine my surprise when my dog greeted me enthusiastically on the spot.

"You got out?" I said, with displeased astonishment.

He cavorted happily.

I went downstairs and what to my wondering eyes should appear:



"Holy. Cow." I said. He must have scratched so vigorously that he broke the wood and popped out one slat and loosened two others. Then he must have wiggled through the opening. A wooden slat lay on the floor; chips of wood were scattered around.

I was almost awed by his accomplishment. Then I felt a sense of dread. What damage would I find in the house? I walked all around my place, looking for unspeakable messes, and I found he had indeed done (ahem) inappropriate things, but not irreparable damage--except to his box.

Who would have thought this little guy could stage a violent prison break?



I later found a package at the front door and guessed that the deliverer thereof probably rang the doorbell. Under the best of circumstances, the dog reacts to the doorbell with a high level of energy and action. After being in solitary confinement for a great many hours, I suspect the sound of the doorbell ringing was enough to send him berserk.

Today, he and I went to Petco to buy him a new crate--a metal one--which I must assemble tonight, as I can't leave him alone in the house until I'm able to secure him, and I do want to go to church tomorrow.

Dropping by

It's been particularly busy at work for me. I hope to take a break starting this weekend until after New Year's. So far, we're having a rainy, mild winter. We did have a "dusting" of snow, as they call it, yesterday morning. I'm good with no snow because it makes driving to work a hassle.

Waiting for the Light

Well, I guess we're one week away from winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. I will be glad when that's past and I can tell myself the days are getting longer again. It is hard to wake up in the morning when it is still dark outside.

I believe the church chose this time of year to celebrate Christ's birth because it is symbolic of the light coming into the world.

A brief sort-of conversation

The phone rang tonight as I was finishing supper. I trotted from the kitchen across the family room to get it. I looked at the caller i.d. and it was a company that provides a service to my house. I wondered if my payment was late. I answered. A recording said, "Please continue to hold." I hung up. "I don't think so," said I.

Amen to that

I’ve always preferred the term “late bloomer” to “complete failure” . . .

Max Lindenmann, Diary of a Wimpy Catholic, Avoiding the Advent Trap

First Sunday of Advent 2012

Taize: "Wait for the Lord," Jacques Berthier, 1923-1994

Chorus:

Wait for the Lord, whose day is near.
Wait for the Lord, keep watch, take heart.

Descant verses:

Prepare the way for the Lord.
Make a straight path for God.
Prepare the way for the Lord.

Rejoice in the Lord always.
God is at hand.
Joy and gladness for all who seek the Lord.

The glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
All the earth will see the Lord.

I waited for the Lord,
My Lord and my God.

Seek first the kingdom of God.
Seek and ye shall find.

Time and space

From "Advent Retreat" at Sacred Space:

Ignatius suggests that whatever time you allocate to your prayer, you should be faithful to it, even if you are bored or find it difficult or distracting. Many people say ‘I don’t feel I’m getting anywhere’ but you are offering God your goodwill, time and space. God does the rest, deep in your being where you cannot notice what is going on.

Little hands

This is a tale of my great-niece. Here she is with my niece, her mommy.



Every other week, my niece comes over to my house while I'm at work and does a little housework for me. I have contracted with her to do this because I tend never to get around to it, and then my house gets unacceptably dirty.

My great-niece is preschool age, and she comes with my niece. When I get home in the evening after they've been here, the cleanliness tells me my niece was here, but I find other clues revealing my great-niece's visit.

The next time I turn on my TV, for example, it's tuned in to a station that shows children's programming, and the volume is rather louder than I generally have it.

A while back, I bought this dog carrier on wheels, thinking I would need it to smuggle my dog into my workplace.



It turned out, happily, that there was no objection to my bringing my dog, so now I just walk boldly into the building with him on a leash, and this carrier stays home.

Meanwhile, back when I was in college, my mom gave me a gift of a little stuffed lamb. Perhaps I was a bit old for such a gift, but my mom doesn't see it that way.

This is what I look like about now:



This is what my mom sees when she looks at me:



So one time I came home after the housecleaning, and eventually I noticed that the little stuffed lamb was in the dog carrier. The next time I saw my great-niece she said, "I was at your house." I said, "I know, because I found a little lamb in the dog carrier." She giggled.

The last time they were here, after I was home a while, I noticed my dog was nosing around the box I got for him. He likes to sit in there sometimes.



I noticed the door was shut and latched, and I knew the little girl had found that interesting. So I opened the door for him, but noticed after a little while that he did not go in the box. So I looked more closely and realized the little stuffed lamb was in there. So I took it out to make room for him.

I'm guessing that my great-niece likes to pretend that the little white lamb is my little white(ish) dog.



It's kind of fun to find evidence of my little sweetheart's playing around my house.

And that's my story.

One degree of separation

Beautiful sunny clear autumn day today in great state of Washington. My folks and I drove to Birch Bay to look at the water, which was a stunning blue color.

I was going to post some pictures, but I got this message from Blogger:

Whoops! You're out of space. You are currently using 100% of your 1 GB quota for photos. Upgrade storage

Photos are stored in your Picasa Web Albums account and are included in your 1 GB free quota for photos. Additional storage you purchase is shared between several Google products and is in addition to your free quota. Learn more   I will probably buy storage, if I must, but I have to think it over first.   Meanwhile, here's a link to a Facebook photo album, which includes the photos I was going to post here.

Oh, boy, oh, boy

I made my sister laugh by telling her about my dog's reaction when I sing in the car. My dog goes to work with me, and on the commute he spends much of the time with his paws on the dashboard, snorting excitedly at pedestrians, bicyclers, and dogs.

Get your motor runnin',
Head out on the highway,
Lookin' for adventure,
And whatever comes our way.

Sometimes I sing in the car, because I'm such an irrepressibly exuberant lark. Or just because some tune drifts into my mind. The dog pays no heed. There were a couple days last week where I kept bursting into "Danny Boy." He would not pay attention as I warbled my way through the first verse:

Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling,
From glen to glen and down the mountain side.
The summer's gone, and all the roses falling;
It's you, it's you must go, and I must bide.

But come ye back when summer's in the meadow,
Or all the valley's hushed and white with snow...

Until I got to:

It's I'll be heeeeeeeeeeeeeere in sunshine or in shadow...

I'd strain, not altogether successfully, for the note of here, and my dog would turn his head and look at me, then cock his head to one side.

Every time.

Here's how the song should sound:



But my performance is more like Beaker's:

Boerenjongens

Tonight I tried to make boerenjongens ("farm boys"), a Dutch sweet or dessert topping consisting of raisins, sugar, and brandy. I looked online for recipes and found them from as complicated as one that involved zesting a lemon -- a thing I have never done -- to one that is basically equal parts sugar, raisins, and brandy.

I tried a combination of recipes. I measured how many cups of raisins I had, then measured that much water and that much sugar into a pan. I threw in some cinnamon and a little ground cloves. I heated and stirred till the sugar dissolved and the water started to boil. Then I put the raisins in. I had bought one box of regular (dark) raisins and one of "golden" raisins. I stirred and simmered the raisins in the sugar water for 20-25 minutes, then I spooned a few raisins at a time into a small strainer and from there into the canning jars (which I had prepared by washing and then keeping in a warm oven). The 12 small glass canning jars I had bought turned out to be the perfect size, the raisins just filled them. Then I boiled and stirred the remaining sugar water for a while to "reduce" it. I poured some into a measuring pitcher then poured in an equal amount of brandy, then poured the sugar water/brandy mixture into each jar of raisins until they were full. Then I put the lids on.

Things got a little sticky -- literally. If I happened to dribble some of that sugar water onto the stove, it was sticky to clean up, the spoons I used got sticky, and I'm fearful that when I go to take the lid off one of these jars it will be glued there by sticky syrup.

I also felt that maybe instead of mixing the sugar water with the brandy to pour into the jars, I should have just poured brandy in, to make them stronger. And I worried that the sugar water was still hot enough to evaporate the alcohol in the brandy so that the final product will not be an alcoholic treat. But, there they are. You're supposed to wait a certain amount of time to open and eat them. That time varied, too, in the recipes, from serving it the next day to waiting a minimum of three months. I plan to try one jar out around Christmas or New Year's.

I already think next year, less syrup, more brandy. But anyway, I'm sure the sugar will help them taste good.

I am a little fearful if they'll be okay. In the old days, canning gone wrong resulted in botulism. But part of me also says, How wrong can it go? It's raisins, sugar, and brandy.

So I decided not to give any jars away until I consume one and survive.