Uncle. Aunt. Third cousin twice removed. Whatever relative you like.

[mrissa]

The lussekatter, you will recall, eventually did rise. Hurrah. But my favorite music box is broken and the meringues won't mer, and I have given up. No meringues this year. I have made them a dozen times, and it always went better than this. I think the cream of tartar is old, and I will get new cream of tartar next year, and we will have meringues then. But this morning it is not Solstice, and it's not Christmas Eve, and I accept defeat. No meringues. Also no driving my dad mad with the music box when he comes to fetch me for our Christmas Eve outing. It will still be Christmas without those things. I know that. I'm still not pleased with them. I think I can be allowed to have a merry Christmas and not be merry about a few things in specific.

(Two notes: these are not just any meringues, so going out and buying me random bakery meringues absolutely will not help and will probably make me miserable instead. Also, I am an experienced baker and know what to try to fix things like meringues that won't mer, and none of it worked, and so now is not the time to poke your nose in suggesting that what I really ought to have done to make the meringues go was ______. Thanks.)

I mean, I could sing "Jingle Bells" in a really annoying nasal voice, and it would probably also drive my dad nuts, but it just wouldn't be the same. The point is not to drive my dad nuts at random. That's not how this goes. It's to pull the string on the music box. To no avail, and markgritter tried fixing it and did not manage it, in such a way that I think this music box has reached the end of its tinny, annoying, beloved lifespan.

Also I still can't lean on my left elbow without the pain shooting up my arm, and it was ten days ago that I had that fall, and sure, I've had others since, but not on that elbow. Bah.

Pretty soon my relentless good cheer and bloody-minded optimism will come flooding back to me. But now would be a good time to tell me a few of your favorite things.

Here, I'll start:
1. gaaldine's evil laugh in its tiny breathy evil juggernaut glory.
1a. When gaaldine is laughing evilly because she's being evil to the_overqual. That enhances the experience so much.
2. Godkids and niecelet, together again for the first time.
3. Icelandic Christmas goblin in the mail (thanks, A.!).

Comments

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

1. Snow, in great quantities.
2. The first day of not having to wear a coat after receiving snow in great quantities.
3. Dogs that rest their chin on your leg when you're trying to read or work at the computer.
4. Dogs that rest their chin on your leg when you're trying to read or work at the computer and also know that being told, "Bed!" means you'd like them to go be somewhere not right on top of you for a while.
5. The certain knowledge that I'll be able to get out to see the horse today.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Ista has been wanting to rest her chin on my wrist (or shoulder, if I'm sitting somewhere congenial) all the time. She likes some parts of holidays, like the bonus monkeys, but the bit where her own monkeys keep running around doing stuff is not nearly so acceptable.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

You're a far more experienced baker than I, but: the humidity has been pretty high.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Ayep.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

As of yesterday I have found and purchased flour, baking powder, and vanilla, so I can bake! No cocoa, so I won't be baking brownies which for some reason I have been wanting, but oh well.

Flour here comes in really tiny cute bags. (Rice on the other hand comes in big huge gallumphing bags and it is easier to buy soy sauce by the liter than by the (equivalent of the) cup. This is a true statement of relative priorities.)

We just had some of the best New Orleans shrimp ever, at Ruth's Chris (Ted's birthday dinner) so I think I may try again to recreate it for Christmas dinner appetizer. I don't care what Charles Kuralt says is authentic Cajun, balsamic vinegar is clearly not the way to go.

(Also, the Shiraz with dinner was excellent so if this comment is particularly disjointed that's why.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Do you really make brownies with cocoa? Interesting.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

1. mrissa's chocolate-covered apricots.
2. The fact that my Conscience of Doom has eased up enough that I can list #1 without panicking with "oh noes, mrissa will think I am asking her to make and send me chocolate-covered apricots!"
3. onehipmama looking wonderfully cute and scraggly first thing in the morning.
4. Church two days in a row, starting today!
5. New chocolate-covered fleece-lined Crocs, courtesy of an early Christmas present.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Oops. #5 above should be chocolate-colored. Not covered. But damn, those apricots are good.

Favorite things (a random selection)

[aedifica]

1. My relationship with my sister, which is such that yesterday she told me "You know, I was hoping to get you X for Christmas, but it's been sold out everywhere I've looked, so I may end up getting you something else instead" and then when I saw X at the grocery store I called her to say "Hey, they have X at the grocery store, would you like me to get you one?" And thus did I end up buying my own Christmas present, with much amusement on both sides. [Both sides meaning "my sister and me," not "the present and me."]

2. Cell phones and the internet, which let me stay connected to my friends and family (I can email my dad when he's in Thailand, even though it's the middle of the night there when I'm awake, and I could call my sister when I was out shopping even though she was in Virginia at the time, etc).

3. My SO remembered something I said I might like for a present, and got it for me! I feel extra-special, because he has a hard time remembering things like that and he obviously made an extra effort. So now I have some of my favorite perfume (it makes me smell like something sweet and tasty and autumnal), plus the warm fuzzy of knowing he cared to remember it.

4. Knowing that some of my favorite far-off relatives will be coming to visit in a few months for another reunion of that side of the family.

Also, I don't know you well enough to know if this is something you already use or something you wouldn't be at all interested in, but have you tried arnica gel on your bruises? It's available at co-ops, and it's said to help heal bruises faster. I've never done a study of it (arnica on one bruise and not on another equal one) but a friend of mine has done that and she said the arnica side did heal much faster than the non-arnica side. (She and I both do hula-hooping, and if one hoops for very long when one isn't used to it one can develop bruises. I just thought I'd mention that so nobody thought either of us were battered women, 'cuz we're not.)

Re: Favorite things (a random selection)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it is best not to have an amused Christmas present.

I haven't gotten to try the arnica yet, although papersky recommended it. Haven't seen it anywhere I've been and haven't wanted to run down to the hippie grocery for a special trip.

[mamapduck.livejournal.com]

I hate when baking (or candy) projects Don't Come Off, even though you know that you know how to do them. Vexing. That's what it is.

Favorite things:

1. The reading of Dancing Dan. Which shall be tomorrow evening so that Gurdymonkey can share in it. (Ooooh. I have to go out for Tom and Jerry mix.)

2. Opening the box of Christmas ornaments and seeing old friends.

3. A Christmas Story in random bits over the day.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I have a wee mousie ornament where the Grandpa Mouse (with spectacles and a fringe of hair around the edge) is reading to the little girl mouse (in pink footie jammies) who is in his lap in the rocking chair. You can't see in the ornament, but I can tell you he's reading Just-So Stories. Grandma made it. It is the best ornament.

[writingortyping.livejournal.com]

Very current favorite things:

1. The sock yarn that arrived yesterday, and the fact that it includes a colorway named for a certain African gemstone.
2. The fact that later today we're getting together with a gentleman I once dubbed, "The Mayor of the Battery Park Ritz" (his real name is Ivor, which is also an excellent name - I think everyone needs to know an Ivor, especially if he happens to be a large, bonhomous Irishman).

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Our neighbor to the north was an Ivor, but it didn't do us much good.

[athenais.livejournal.com]

1. The piercing blue of a sunny, cold winter sky.
2. Candles, lit and flickering, throughout my house.
3. The smell of John's mändel rohr cookies baking.
4. Sleeping in and staying up as long as I like. Freedom!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I googled but couldn't get a recipe for mändel rohr cookies within the first couple pages -- what's in them?

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

I think what really would have made the meringues rise was pirates.

Arrrrr.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Alas, but we were out, and I didn't feel like running to the grocery in the early morning snow.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

Queen Elizabeth II is now on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/theroyalchannel
Note: she does not speak The Queen's English. Well, she does; but not the most prestigious form of British English.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

This is one of your favorite things?

[redbird]

Making us flounder in cream sauce for dinner last night--I hadn't cooked dinner in a week, because I was worn out from travel--and good baguette from the farmer's market to go with it.

Ducks!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I'm glad I went and looked at your lj to clarify that the ducks were the living kind.

[pameladean]

a. snow blowing past my window, sideways, with a bonus crow hanging onto the evergreen for dear life, and complaining.
b. those times when the book writes itself, just for a few minutes.
c. waking up in bed so surrounded by cats that it's impossible to turn over. This is strictly a winter phenomenon.
d. an occultation of Mars by the Moon, even if it will be too cloudy to see it.
e. Mrissas.

P.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Like you, too, it turns out.

wow speedy post

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

favorite things. We have snow! And only just after everyone arrived from NY. Including a Benni! The smell of the Piparkökur, a new favorite.. more later.

Re: wow speedy post

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We have snow all day, but it didn't stop me from seeing the people I was supposed to see, yay!

[kizmet-42.livejournal.com]

1. Snickerdoodle cookies, which also require cream of tartar. I learned several years ago that it keeps for a very long time in the freezer, far longer than on a pantry shelf. This year I learned that it does not extend the life of CoT indefinately, and my snickerdoodles are far more doodly than snickery.

2. Roasted root veggies. I have a melange of turnips, kohlrabi, rutabaga, potatoes and fennel (with a red onion on one side for those that like that sort of thing) with olive oil, salt and pepper in the oven right now.

3. My favorite Christmas song, "It's the Thought That Counts" by Twila Paris, which I have held off listening to until tonight. I think I'm ready to listen it, as it's far more than a "chestnuts" and "snow" song and I don't want to become immune to its message.

4. I did not cause an author friend to crash and burn with a harsh but true comment about his work. Instead, he's cut thousands of words and rewritten a couple of scenes and improved the story. That is truly my favorite thing about this week.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

4. is important. 4. is initially sometimes hard to trust.

[zwol.livejournal.com]

1. Shiny rocks.
   
2. Sandy rocks.
   
3. ... Really just about any kind of rocks.
   
4. Pasta with basil pesto and mushrooms.
   
5. The kind of cold, clear air you get just after a winter storm. It's my very favoritest time to go for walks.
   
6. A nice quiet afternoon sitting on the couch messing around on the internets, next to queenpam, who is doing the same.
   

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I am also fond of basil pesto and mushrooms.

[aszanoni.livejournal.com]

Snowlight. For I now live where I have snow. Waking up to snowlight is a marvelous thing.

Snow! Lots of snow. Snow that went away, but returns now. Despite the wind's desire to carry it back off.

Being able to get bored in my house, and know that I am a short car ride from people, as opposed to hours of plane-ride. And then visiting them! :D

Finding today that I can actually make soup in a rice cooker, thus saving the soup that the ancient electric skillet scoffed at all afternoon.

Working on a rush story with my editor, and having a very pleasant time doing so.

Chica*---

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Soup in a rice cooker! How very efficient of you!

cream of tartar?

[teadog1425.livejournal.com]

Commiserations on the meringues... I'm just delurking to ask 'cream of tartar'? I've only ever made meringues to the Delia Smith recipe (UK Martha Stewart type woman) and the only ingredients she uses are egg whites and (LOTS) of caster sugar. What does the cream of tartar do?... if you don't mind explaining!

Merry Christmas! Tam

Re: cream of tartar?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It stabilizes the meringues, and these call for regular rather than caster sugar, which is harder to find in the US than it ought to be (although you can get it at Byerly's). So the texture needs something to account for the difference.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

Because I'm so late to the party, I'm only going to list one good thing. Because hey, good things are never bad things. That's why we call them "good" and "things."

Anyway, for the second year in a row, I got a present in red and green robot wrapping. I mean, seriously. If there is a cooler wrapping available, I'm not sure I can handle it.