33 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 12-19-17”

  5. But it seems that most of those recipes are for disserts.
    And disserts we have a plenty.
    I’ll check further because I have the address for Gemma. (

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  6. Ah, an adult hawk this time. AJ, did you identify whether it is Cooper’s or sharp-shinned?

    If you don’t know, this link has good info, including the comments section, where several people have submitted photos and others have IDd them: http://www.audubon.org/news/a-beginners-guide-iding-coopers-and-sharp-shinned-hawks . (The top few sent for ID received nothing, but keep scrolling down in the comments and there are several that do have people saying which it is.)

    With my bird in the spruce tree, I couldn’t see the end of its tail, so that couldn’t be included in my ID, but I had estimated its size (first glance out of my peripheral vision I thought dove, and I’ve often seen doves in that tree, so I figured it was dove-size and that said sharp-shinned), I could see its legs in some photos and they definitely were the skinny ones of a sharp-shinned, and it was a juvenile and its plumage matched sharp-shinned juvenile. In some photos, the back of its head looked more like a Cooper’s, but with everything else saying sharp-shinned, I was content it was probably one.

    Since raptor females are larger than males, a female sharp-shinned is said to be not much smaller than a male Cooper’s, but size can be the most obvious difference if it is a male or smaller female sharp-shinned or if it’s a female Cooper’s–as long as you can determine the size, and for a distant shot you can’t always do so. I’ve determined “Cooper’s” by size several times (seeing them on a picket fence near my kitchen window where I have often seen smaller birds, and thus I have a mental sense of its size in comparison), and “sharp-shinned” by size once before this. (I’d noted in that case that the bird was about the size of a blue jay–when it flew into the tree that was my first guess until it landed–and that means very small for a hawk and thus it was a sharp-shinned.) If I’d seen mine in the blue spruce only through the window, I wouldn’t have had a clue what size it was, but when my first instinct compared it to a dove, and I know what doves look like in that tree, size-wise, I figured it is likely to be the smaller hawk. And the field marks of legs and markings agreed.

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  8. Kim, what does “ready for Christmas” entail? I have all my gifts except something I ordered as “stocking stuffers” for the girls and it’s no big deal if that doesn’t come. I have wrapped and shipped the ones being mailed (my sister’s kids and my goddaughter). We aren’t putting up a tree, so that part is done. 🙂 We aren’t hosting (usu. we do Christmas morning, but our married daughter is doing so this year–our first invitation to their new house other than just to see it when they bought it), and so I have no preparation even for that.

    I need to wrap the gifts for local family. But also have to finish my Christmas letter and mail it, so this year it will probably be late. I’m also trying to make a gift for my mother-in-law, and waiting for something that is supposed to come tomorrow that should help me with that. But overall I’m glad that this year it isn’t some big event, and that the gifts to be shipped have been sent.

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  9. I’m going Christmas shopping today after Adorable duty. Macy’s kindly gave me $40 in Macy’s “cash,” that needs to be spent today–and then I may be able to max it out with other discounts. Problem is, I don’t know what I want/need from Macy’s.

    Mr. Fit wants a chin up bar for the garage. I hope I can buy something like that at the local sporting good stores . . . Fortunately, everything opens at 7 am!

    15 Christmas cards to go–I would have finished them yesterday but I got to write a magazine article instead–which I now need to submit. Catch you later!

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  10. Headline on Drudge:
    “Going 80 mph on a 30 mph track”
    Immediately reminded me of a Hank Snow song: “Going 90 miles per hour on a dead end street.”

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  11. I haven’t needed to “get ready for Christmas for over a dozen years now.” Getting ready was Elvera’s problem. The only thing I had to do was get her a present. I may have told this before, but.
    I always had to get a present for Elvera. It wasn’t easy because she already has everything. Not much. But it has to be something and it has to be wrapped pretty. Her’s was the only present under the tree that was professionally wrapped.
    One time, early in our marriage. I got her a negligee. She said, “I can’t wear this around here!”. And we exchanged it. One time, the wrapping cost more than the present inside.
    We don’t exchange gifts anymore.

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  12. Good morning!

    Everyone at my house is in a much better frame of mind with the good news we got yesterday. He will start physical therapy after Christmas.

    Burrito sales are slow this morning. I think tomorrow will be the last day. The excavation crew left at the end of last week.

    I am not ready for Christmas. We have delivered gifts to 2 house holds of grandchildren, but still have 4 more to go. I need to get the package to Phoenix in the mail. I have none of the others wrapped. I still need to figure something for the nieces and nephew’s that will be at Miguel’s mother’s. I do have the little gifts wrapped for Trey’s friends. They are 3 little girls, and we have been babysitting their milk goat while they went to Missouri.

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  14. “One time, the wrapping cost more than the present inside.” — entirely possible, some of the beautiful wrapping paper and ribbons and other doodads can cost a pretty penny. But it’s all so pretty!

    We were never really ‘ready’ for Christmas, but it came and it was good, anyway. I’m still finishing up whatever decorating I am going to do. My little 3-foot tree is still on the front porch, will plan to bring that in today. It’s really quite adorable as it’s very, very full. I’ll leave the little rosemary tree in a pot on the porch in its place, maybe try to find a little string of battery lights to wrap around that.

    And I need to send out cards today, it’s now or never.

    So one of the very handy things about having a smart phone is you can check what’s wrong with your car. I was just pulling up to the curb to park on Franklin & Gower in Hollywood yesterday when I spotted a new dash light was on: “O/D Off”

    I had no idea what that meant. So I quickly looked it up on the iPhone — turns out it’s “Overdrive” and i’d accidentally punched a button on the gear shift. Problem solved.

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  15. Well Cheryl, there are currently 4 presents under the tree. One isn’t wrapped. None have any of my fancy embellishments (Mumsee?) they do have stick on tags to say who gets them. I do not possess the gumption to figure out the sides to Christmas dinner are this year nor argue with Mr. P on the best way to cook the tenderloin. As much as he is willing to do and take control of the better.
    I need one more thing for him and have decided they 3 children who will be at my house on Christmas day will receive some cash. Everything will be on sale after Christmas and my money will go further. I need one more thing for Mr. P because it does matter to him.

    My birthday is the first Saturday in January and I told him I didn’t care what he did for Christmas but I wanted something for my birthday. His reply was that he wished he hadn’t bought the diamond earrings for my last birthday. 😉

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  16. Despite growing up in a Christian family, my brother and sister are not believers (the latter calls herself a Hindu Quaker). Granddaughter, E, who is almost seven has learned that Aunt B doesn’t believe in Jesus and is quite concerned. She was insistent on getting her a Bible for Christmas, even though I tried to discourage her and told her that Aunt B would be mad. We bought one at Walmart Wednesday night. E asked me to take it when I met my sister the next day so she “can read it before Christmas to find out about the baby Jesus.” I was also instructed to pass on the rules, “don’t throw it, don’t tear out any pages, and don’t treat it mean.” Aunt B was, indeed, mad and said she’s “going to find a book to return the favor.” I told E that Aunt B is going to find a book that says Jesus wasn’t real but E is sure that there cannot be any such book.

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  17. Good for E! She’s a special one!

    I’m ready for Christmas. I was watching a Christmas movie last night (yet again) and felt like I should be doing something, but there was nothing to do. 🙂

    I did go online and start my grocery order for husband to pick up when he’s in town tomorrow. It’s a wonderful thing to order all your groceries, arrive at the store and park in the designated area and call in to say you’re there. They bring the groceries out to your car and you only spend 2 minutes grocery shopping! It’s going to change our Sundays!!! (Since we usually only go in once a week on Sundays (church) we end up doing our grocery shopping afterwards before heading home. We do not enjoy our Sunday afternoons. ) Now we’ll just be able to make the quick stop and get on the road to home!

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  18. I am not ready for Christmas. Give me another month, and then I might get the decorating done that I would like to do. I have most of the gifts bought and wrapped. I still need to buy and wrap a belt for my brother.

    We arrived right before 7 a.m. at the imaging center for Art’s MRIs. He kept still so nothing had to be redone. We will wait to discuss the results with his doctor.

    We went to the Irish Christmas concert last night. That is with the wonderful Keith and Kristen Getty, their backup band, and special guests. Art had invited his choir director to go with us.

    Along the way home, as he returned from wkrk, he found himself stuck in standstill traffic due to an overturned tractor trailor. He had forgotten to get his phone as he left from work. It was charging. So he had no way to let anyone know. I sat at home waiting, and the choir director was sitting in the church parking lot. Art was suppose to meet us sound 6 p.m. It was after 7 p.m. when he finally arrived. He was so mad about having left his phone, and his face was redder than I have ever seen it. We did go see what was left of the first part. It was excellent just as it was the year before. I really enjoyed being in the company of his choir director. She is around thirty and so personable. She offered to go get the car for us when the concert finished, and she drove us home. That was a treat. Art’s church had just done Lessons and Carols on Sunday for their morning worship service. So it was especially relevantt when that was done last night with the Irish twist.

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  20. Janice, leaving or forgetting your phone at work is the worst. Once I was almost home and actually turned around to go back to retrieve it. The second time it happened, we’d been given work-issued iPhones (which I seldom used) so I knew that was with me and I just left my personal phone on my desk, figuring it was probably buried under some random stack of notes and government reports anyway so no one would be likely to take it. It was there the next morning.

    I’ve also forgotten it occasionally while heading out for work and have had to turn back to get it (we no longer have the work-issued phones). I really can’t operate very well through a work (or any other) day without it now.

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  21. My computer has been updating daily for several days, each day asking me for the most convenient time. This time it seems to have stripped everything, so I have to sign up here all over again. I sure better be able to access the e-mail account I couldn’t access while out of town last week (having forgotten the password)! It’s my main one, and I’d be in trouble if I couldn’t get into it.

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  22. RK- Do you ship frozen burritos? What is in them? I could go for a real burrito.

    Or better yet, a real tamale. There aren’t too many places around here that make them. Where we used to live, there was a taquería on my way home from work that sold tamales two for a dollar. They were wonderfully tasty. Back home in Tucson, some people put raisins in the tamales. Those were good.

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  23. Was that Windows 10, Cheryl? We’re hearing awful stories about that major update. It keeps asking me, but I keep putting it off three more days. Others have just turned on their computer and discovered it updated. 😦

    Macy’s did me a favor with that $40 Christmas cash–I bought a pair of books and another pair of shoes for $37–how do they make money?

    I then went upstairs and bought two more gifts–but also got a discount since it was a one day only sale. Nailed it.

    Only two more gifts to go.

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  24. I just wonder what kind of miserable person you have to be to be offended that a child gave you a gift. We had Dirty Santa at the office and someone brought their grandson. He wanted the 10 pounds of dry roasted peanuts I ended up with. He braided a bracelet out of napkins to give me in exchange.
    I think any gift a child gives from their heart like your grand daughter, Linda, should be told thank you and it should be graciously accepted.

    Why are atheist so angry all of the time?

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  25. We have a couple of dueling “tam-A-le!” guys in our town, they push carts and are seen all over town, even going down our residential block now and again.

    And a woman at work used to make homemade tamales that many would buy at Christmas time, but she left at some point.

    Mailed some cards today. I need a smallish red tablecloth. Tuesday morning was down to a few random holiday placemats.

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  28. Michelle, it turns out that after the update, the computer apparently opened Internet Explorer (which is not the search engine I use, and therefore my passwords were not saved in it). But in the process I had to choose a new password for my e-mail, since I couldn’t get into it . . . and I think I might have come up with the same one I used last time but couldn’t remember. 🙂 At any rate, I now know what it is, so I should remember next time we travel!

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  29. Ten year old is teaching sixteen year old how to make cookies. Well, how to form them and put them on the tray. Sixteen year old could help her with the making if ten year old could stay ahead of her and direct her. I might try that another time.

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