We made it

Hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful.  Hope you ate until you popped, and then just vegetated the afternoon away!

We are here at the SSB, and the throng of relatives have all gone home.  At one point, we had 12 humans, two dogs, and one cat within out 1700 (about) square foot house.  For the most part,  the weather cooperated, and (remember - my family hunts because we like venison) there was always  one or two out hunting.

The only hiccup was that my daughter and family were trying to leave on Thanksgiving Day as soon as possible.  They had a wedding on Friday.  That is a strange day for a wedding, but then the bride is a strange one anyway.  I was surprised there was such a push to go to this event.  The bride has caused all sorts of problems.  She is a nutcase who really caused my eldest granddaughter problems.
I will never again, however, have dinner ready at noon on Thanksgiving again.  It was totally rushed.  I had a ham that was supposed to cook in the slow cooker for 6 hours.  With a normal dinner time, no problem.  At noon - I had to put it in the night before, and it was completely over cooked and basically ruined.  Never.  Again.
I was a little worried about the time we were together.  There is a BIG political divide in the family, but nothing was said at all.  Each newscast did worry me, however!
And so now we are cleaning up the remains of a total of eight days with people here.  That is a considerable mess.  Our septic is rather small, so I am worried about that.  After uncounted numbers of dishwasher runnings, showers, and general use, I am trying to spread out the uses of the washing machine.  Today it is the mountain of towels.
So now we are on to the Christmas season.

As close as it gets

I strive and will continue to strive to keep politics COMPLETELY out if this venue.  This one is as close as it will come because it applies to both of the sides.

I worry about what is going to happen after tomorrow.  This crazy campaign has caused so much hatred in this nation.  Lies are taken as the absolute truths.

Even our family, as tightly knit as I once thought, has been split by this campaign.  There are hurts that I don't believe will ever heal.  The chasm is so deep.

We are the laughing stock of the world.  I heard today that other nations are looking at this fiasco and laughing.  And why shouldn't they?

I am afraid things will never be the same again.

This and that

Nothing really spectacular has been happening in these parts recently.  I just had nothing to say/post!  But that changed on Friday.

Before that - ending DLST.  I don't care which way we mess with the time, I am tired afterward.  I should be highly refreshed and good to go, but I am dragging.  I am so close to completion of Steven King's marathon novel  Needful Things, but I cannot keep my eyes open to finish it.  It is working like a sleeping pill.  But I will bet you that if I tried to read it TO go to sleep, it wouldn't work that way.  Melatonin or whatever - when insomnia hits, it hits hard.

Now Friday!  My pantry has been updated.  I had my contractor get his cabinet guy to make the pull out drawers to go on the shelves.  I haven't been able to get to the back of the lowest and next to lowest shelves in way over 10 years.

Getting ready for the installation of the shelves, I pulled everything out.  Some of it was just flat disgusting.  The only way I could have reached it before was getting on the floor.  Nice if I were still 60.  There is no way for me to get up from a tile floor these days.  I would have to kneel, and my beloved (deceased) orthopedist told me the only way I could get on my knees was with a well-padded surface, and he didn't like that either.  He said that padding the patella between outside sources and the titanium knee is never very successful.  The patella tends to crack.

So this weekend I have been putting the rescued items back into the pantry.  I knew all along I would be minus a couple of inches because of the glides for the drawers.  That was a pretty good swap for me.  What I didn't realize was that even though glass bottles and all could go right up to the outside, I would still run out of room for what had been in the pantry.  And this is even after discarding a lot of stuff that was outdated.  (the old out of sight - out of mind thing, only it was out of reach - pretty much out of mind)

My biggest offender in the pantry is duplicate herbs and spices.  Who in their right mind needs three bottles of cloves?  Well - I guess I needed some cloves three times, and couldn't find them.  Who needs three bottles of molasses?  Again, I guess I did three times.  Those things just pushed themselves into the deep dark recesses of that pantry.

I am still going to have a problem with the herbs and spices.  They all nestle down into that drawer with its four-inch sides (thus covering the labels completely) unless I do something.  So I have come up with my next (as if I needed a next) project.  I am going to make labels to go on the lids of these items.  At least I might have a fighting chance.

So - next week, I will be busy making labels!  I will let you know how that comes out!