Utah

I am in Utah with Paul for the week.  He has family here and we're just hanging out, eating, playing games, drinking and sightseeing.  We've had Christmas and we're going to have a New Year's Eve party.  These people know how to party.  It's a very good time.

We're in a small town outside of Salt Lake City.  The geography here is so new to me.  For one, this is my first time in Utah. I'm used to traveling through states where I've lived and I know basically where the major cities are and what their suburbs are.  That is not the case here.  Also, I'm used to mountainous regions being to the west.  Here, we're in the middle of Utah Valley and there are mountains all the way around us.  Another thing -- we're right next to the Wasatch Range.  It's kind of odd to look up and see a mountain peak soaring 11,000 feet above me.  In Denver, you're so far away from the mountains that you can't get a real sense of how big they are.  And once you get closer, the foothills are so huge that you've lost sight of the mountain peaks and still can't see how tall they are.  So this perspective on mountains is quite breathtaking.  I'm loving it.

Last night we took the UTA Trax system into Salt Lake City to see the lights at Temple Square.  I took lots of pictures.  I am, by no means, a photographer and my camera is rather puny but last night we worked quite well together.  I got some good shots that I'm pleased with, especially considering the lighting that was available.

Here's the inside of the train.  They are nearly identical to the Light Rail cars in Denver so I felt right at home.  This particular train was pretty empty.

Some of the scenery out of the train windows.  I was kind of excited to go to Sandy.  You see, one of my favorite television shows is the HBO series, Big Love.  It's set in Sandy, Utah and I thought that Sandy was a fictional place until Paul told me it is, indeed, a real town.  Not only is it a real place, that's where we got on the train.  So I had to take a photo of this sign.

This is the shopping center where we got coffee before walking to Temple Square.  It's pretty and it has lots of cool shops in it.  If I appreciated shopping and crowds more, I'd probably really enjoy a place like this.  But I don't so it's mostly good for people watching and coffee sipping.  And photo snapping.

A pretty cool mural in the Union Pacific Train Station.  I love real train stations -- you know the ones where people can get on an Amtrak train and it takes them hundreds of miles away, overnight with dining cars and sleeping berths and stuff.  All of them are old and very cool with granite floors and big, carved wood moldings and these cool murals.

A cautionary piece of advice that is posted at almost all street corners.  It made me giggle.

Some other cool shots of downtown Salt Lake City.  It's very pretty and there is a lot of striking architecture.  I was just in awe.  I think Christmas is a particularly good time to experience new cities because they're all gussied up for the holidays.  This way, I get to have these beautiful first impressions as my only impressions.

And now, the main event for last night:  Temple Square.  I must preface this by saying that a friend-slash-co-worker recommended that we "go to Temple Square to see the lights" and I kind of went, "Oh. Yeah, I guess that sounds nice."  I mentioned it to Paul in passing, not really expecting that we'd go because 1) we're neither one religious, and 2) Paul was, at one time, LDS and doesn't have much inclination to revisit that.  So I didn't think there was much reason for us to go.  But when I said it, he was like, "Oh yeah!  We should do that.  The lights are pretty fantastic and the history is interesting."  So we went.  And I am so glad we did.  It is beautiful!

See what I mean?  Gorgeous, no?  I am simply amazed that my camera took photos this clearly at night.  It was really something.

After we finished with our lightseeing (get it? Lightseeing instead of sightseeing? Ha ha!) we got back on the train and headed to a place called Trolley square.  I hear that there is lots of history surrounding that place as well but I'm unclear on most of it.  Anyway, here it is:

Yes, it's a crappy, crappy, crappy picture.  The rest of our group was running across the street while I was taking this picture and I was in a hurry to take it so I didn't get left behind and then a car almost hit me.  Oops.  But I'm okay.

We decided to eat at Old Spaghetti Factory which is inside the shopping mall at Trolley Square.  This is what the wait line for Old Spaghetti Factory looked like.  Lisa, Paul's sister-in-law, went in to ask how long the wait was for a group our size (8 of us) and came out to report that it would be at least an hour.  So some of the group went off to shop and the some of the group went off in search of beer.  I went in search of beer because I am not a shopper.

We actually ended up waiting about an hour and 20 minutes for our tables but it was definitely worth it.  Old Spaghetti Factory isn't exactly original or authentic food but it's very tasty and a really good deal.  I ordered an entree that was easily enough for both Paul and myself.  It came with iced tea or coffee, all the bread I wanted, a side salad and, the best part yet -- spumoni!  Yumyum, yummy, yummolicious!  I would have taken photos but the lighting was terrible and nothing would have shown up.  I did get a picture of the trolley car that is inside the restaurant, though.

Pretty cool, huh?

When we were done eating we walked back to the train and I got some more photos of things that I found to be interesting.

This was pretty neat.  It was at the stop where we waited for one of our return trains.  It's a poem written by a 14-year-old girl named Ruby, I believe.

 This was a funny little train seat all by itself.  Cole called it the lonely hobo seat.

And this is what greeted us when we arrived back in Sandy.  It was freezing fog -- quite the interesting sight.

Anyway, as you can see, we're having a fantastic time.  There is lots of great stuff in store for our remaining days here, too.  I'll be meeting Paul's mom tomorrow and maybe meeting an online friend on Thursday.  I hope the weather cooperates.  We're under a severe winter storm warning right now and it doesn't end until Thursday night or Friday morning.  Gah.

Yay for Arkansas!

Yay for the people in Arkansas, anyway. At least some of the people. This is a good time. All the siblings, I repeat all, are here. That's no easy feat considering our circumstances and geography. We are having a blast.  So, until I can devote more time to a follow up post on this subject, I'll leave you with some word snapshots -- a toast to the matriarch in honor of her graduation; rounds of Boggle with iPhones at the ready for proving or disproving a word's legitimacy; a dozen chatting, laughing people crammed into the kitchen because that's where we always end up. And there's so much more to come!

Sent via Pony Express

I'm Too Emotional & Too Cynical

Found this video.  Watched this video.  Teared up over some of the footage, giggled at other parts of it.


As it ended, I felt affection for this world and all its inhabitants and our interconnectedness.  And then I thought to myself, "This is really just a commercial for Google."

Thanksgiving

Whoa.  Thanksgiving.  It's my favorite holiday because I love to cook and I love to eat.  I love food, period.  Christmas is my second favorite holiday because it has all the same foods (at least, in my family it does) but it also has shopping which I'm not nearly as fond of as cooking.

Anyway, Thanksgiving.  It was delicious.  I made a turkey for the second time.  Last year was my first and I brined it with a pretty sweet brining solution -- "sweet" as in fruity, not as in a surfer dude's "Hey, man! Sweet waves today!"  (Although, surfers usually surf in salt water and brining solutions do contain a lot of salt.  But this really has nothing to do with Turkey Day.  Sorry for that brief foray into my distracted thought process.)  This year I went a little more savory.  There was nothing wrong with last year's brine but I wanted to try something different.  This year's brine was still sweet but more tempered with things like bay leaves and peppercorns and rosemary.  It was so good.  My mouth is watering thinking about it again.  Also, the turkey was huge.  We had to brine it in the massive pot that Caleb uses to brew beer.

Jennifer and I went in together on the cooking and food prep at her house because she's the only one with enough space for that sort of thing. I love her kitchen.  It's huge.  On Tuesday night I went to her place with my car full to the gills with cooking utensils, ingredients, baking pans and my mixer.  We set up the brining situation and called it a night.  (Another plug for living in Colorado -- this turkey and its pot were so big there is no way we could have fit it into the fridge but it was cold enough that we could leave it to sit in the garage all night!  Yay for temps in the low 20s!)

On Wednesday I went back to Jennifer's house, changed into some comfy PJs, poured a glass of wine and got busy!  We chopped veggies and nuts, shredded cheese, mixed pie crusts, mashed potatoes, whipped up pie fillings, dried bread crumbs and had a grand old time.  Friends from Texas arrived late that night and the children had a great time playing video games and chasing each other all over the house.  The adults opened more wine, turned up the music and continued food preparations until 3:00 am.  It was so much fun!

Thursday morning began bright and early with more cooking, roasting, boiling, baking and stirring.  We finally ate around 2:00 pm.  Everything was really good.  I wish I'd had the ability to eat more food but even that night when everyone usually eats the first of the leftovers, I was still too full.  Bummer.

After the meal we sat around the dining table and had a nice Pinot Noir tasting.  The friends from Texas brought a couple of Pinot Noir wines from New Zealand (they lived there for 9 months last year!  Lucky!) and Paul brought over a couple of Colorado Pinot Noir wines.  We all sampled and critiqued and tasted.  Then we opened a dessert wine and a honey wine to try with our desserts.  It was a superb time.  We should do it again before next Thanksgiving because we deserve to eat like that because it's Tuesday sometimes, you know?

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing Carcassone, one of our most favorite board games.  I think I can mark this holiday down as one of the best ever; it ranks right up there with the first Thanksgiving after The Divorce and with the New Year's Eve I spent alone with my homemade pizza and sangria.  Yum.  Truly can't wait to do it again.

List of Stuff, Updated

1. Like I said previously, I am tired of 'random' and 'rambling' so this post is not called that.  It's also not called that because it's an update of a previous post so it's named after that one.  Got it?
2. Antibiotics.  Solomon is taking his horse pills grudgingly, with much choking and coughing and gulping of orange juice.  He has a flare for the dramatic, in case you couldn't tell.  Samuel eagerly awaits the next dose of "the pink stuff" and asks at least a dozen times per day, "Is it time yet? Please?"
3. Miriam woke up Thursday with a supersuper sore throat.  We went to the doctor.  She was diagnosed with strep also.  Big surprise there.  I'm still scratching my head over that one.  /sarcasm
4. I'm even closer to the end of this semester's classes!  Double yay!
5. I did not go to Starbucks to do homework because Miriam camped out on the couch with a pillow and the remote.  Instead of homework, I paid bills and worked on The Budget.
6. My favorite Starbucks drinks are still the whole milk latte and the peppermint mocha.  I went to Starbucks yesterday to do homework and had a cranberry bliss bar with my whole milk latte.  Those were the best tasting calories I had all week.
7. It's been very quiet at "Neighbor's" house since Wednesday.  I can hear her still over there.  She's been vacuuming and still slams doors and cupboards frequently but I haven't heard kids or screaming.  I'm not sure what to think.
8. Still planning to write about Thanksgiving.  I'll get to it eventually.
9. The entire 5th grade took a field trip to the middle school yesterday as a teaser for the orientation, I suppose.  Solomon proclaimed it, "Awesome!"
10. And again, that's all the stuff.  I don't have to pee this time but I do have to go fold some laundry.  As usual, I'll write more stuff again later.  See ya then!

List of Stuff

1. I would have called this post "rambling" or "random" but I'm tired of those words.  "Stuff" is sufficient.
2. Solomon and Samuel were diagnosed with strep throat this week. I'm alternately loving and hating antibiotics. Loving for the obvious reasons -- my kids won't be stricken with rheumatic fever or kidney failure.  Hating because Solomon gags and nearly vomits both the pink, liquid stuff and the quartered horse pills.  Gosh, my life is glamorous.
3. Miriam went to bed tonight with a sore throat.  I reallyreallyreallyreally hope she is not worse in the morning.  I don't want to deal with another round of antibiotics if I can help it.
4. My classes are almost finished for the semester.  Yay!
5. If I'm not taking Miriam to the doctor for a strep test tomorrow morning I'm going to spend most of the day at Starbucks working furiously on the nutrition assignments I have neglected for the last 2 weeks.
6. My new favorite Starbucks beverage is a whole milk latte.  Well, at least during 10 months of the year.  From November to December it's the peppermint mocha.
7. I reported "Neighbor" to CPS yesterday.  For realz.  That's the first time I've done that as a concerned citizen and not as a mandated reporter.
8. Thanksgiving rocked.  It really deserves its own post and I'll do that soon but I couldn't leave it totally unrecognized in this List of Stuff.
9. I got a note today from the middle school welcoming my soon-to-be middle schooler and me to the campus.  We are cordially invited to attend an orientation for the 2011-2012 school year next week.  I had a miniature heart attack.  And then I recovered and added the date to my calendar.  And then I had another miniature heart attack.  I might have another heart attack next week.
10. That's all the stuff.  Well, it's not really All the Stuff Forever but I kinda have to pee so that's all for now.  I'll most likely write more stuff later.