What a Difference a Day Makes!

After 25 hours of wondering at every turn whether we’d make it to our final destination, we finally made it to our destination!

I must say that Delta Airlines treated us very very well, and each flight, the one from Fargo to Minneapolis, as well as the one from Minneapolis to LAX were smooth as glass and arrived ahead of schedule.

Let me just try to express what a joy it is to leave the sub zero frigid, frozen plains, and a mere 5 hours later walk out into an 80 degree bright sunny day! But no, this picture is truly worth a thousand words….

We caught a shuttle from the airport to a small but very friendly car rental agency who held our car through our delay, and didn’t even charge us for the day we missed!

With the help of our iPhone GPS, we drove to the Pasadena area, and right to our cozy and fabulous AirBnB home for the week.  Our hosts left perfect instructions for how to get in, how to access the Internet, down to how to work the television.

But we were starving, having not eaten all day.  We drove up 3/4 of the length of Colorado Boulevard just taking in the sights, and getting the lay of the land. We then doubled back settling on a mexican cocina called Senior Fish, that had a lovely deck allowing us to enjoy our tacos al pastor and beer in the glorious afternoon sun.

We then took advantage of the fact that we didn’t have to worry about whether or not we’d miss a connection, or fail to arrive, and caught up on our emails.  We checked in with our hosts, letting them know we’d arrived, and also with Beverly at Fiesta Parade Floats, to see what time our shift would begin. Beverly told us not to arrive before 9am, as that’s when the designers get there, and there’s a lot of waiting around.

We then found the Trader Joe’s market, and stocked up on organic veggies for our morning smoothies, along with a couple of bottles of wine. Just a side note here, a weeks worth of smoothie supplies, PLUS wine, coffee AND creamer cost less than just smoothie supplies at our local grocery store at home.(Shameless plug for Trader Joes!)

So here we sit, munching on some microwave popcorn and sipping our lovely Trader Joe’s wine, (in the proper glasses no less) feeling the 19 hours we’ve been up start to catch up with us.  Tomorrow we start on our float decorating adventure!

Christmas With the Crankys

There are so many Christmassy lines that fit just now…

‘Twas the night before Christmas….

Oh the weather outside is frightful…

We need a little Christmas, right this very minute…

Let me set the stage.

Downtown Dad and I made a conscious decision to – like the Kranks, “skip Christmas” this year, since all three kids are otherwise occupied with significant others, or away at college. We’re flying out to sunny California to decorate a float that will be in the Rose Parade.

We had an early Christmas Eve dinner with friends. Reservations confirmed, made 6 weeks ago for a 6:00am departure on United from frozen Fargo, arriving on a bright balmy Christmas morning in LA.  A bargain rental car to toodle around in.  A night at the Pasadena Hilton for an elegant Christmas evening before moving into our AirBnB home for the week.

(That’s the sound of a record scratching)

Suddenly, at 7:30pm, 11 hours before we are supposed to take off, we get a “robocall” (not even a real person on the other end) from United Airlines saying our flight had been – not delayed – CANCELLED! But not to worry, they could rebook us TWO DAYS LATER!  TWO DAYS?!?! WTF?!?!

Thus ensued a flurry of calls to Cheapo Air, Expedia, United, and the Pasadena Hilton to try to re-arrange the hopelessly toppling dominoes of our trip.

Cheapo Air came through right away with flying colors (pun intended) by getting us on a flight on American Airlines, on the same day, just much later.  While this was a start, we soon realized that we wouldn’t be able to pick up our rental car, due to late arrival, and therefore would not be able to make our reservations at the Pasadena Hilton.  Calls to Expedia gave us two options, cancel the great deal rental car and rebook for twice the price for one that would be available when we arrived, or cancel our hotel reservations, but to do that we’d have to call in the morning and speak to the manager, since that could only be done by special permission.

After an uneasy night’s sleep, we started what turned out to be 5 hours of circuitous phone calls, the details of which I’ll spare you, suffice to say that we never found anyone at the Pasadena Hilton that would or could authorize our cancellation, so we were out that money.  We were able to notify the car rental agency to let them know we’d pick up the car the next morning. We ended up getting, and having to pay for, another hotel room walking distance from LAX.

Still cranky at United, for their short notice notification, I took my beef to Twitter, letting them know what a fiasco they’d caused us.  I actually got a reply back with a link to their Customer Service Team’s email complaint form.  Not sure what good will come of it, but I filled it out. I also gave a parting shot Tweet back to United saying I wasn’t going to hold my breath for a reply.

So, here we sit, still in the snow, at home when we should have been sipping a cold beverage in LA 5 hours ago, finally about to leave for our rebooked flight.

I knew that that this would be an adventure…..

 

Adventures in Float Decorating

They finally arrived!

The long awaited VIP (Volunteer In Pasadena?) passes for Downtown Dad and me to the Irwindale warehouse where we’ll be decorating a Rose Parade Float later this month!

Sounds super elegant and swanky right? Don’t you just wish you could go along? Well, here’s some great news… even if you can’t come with us, you can enjoy it vicariously right here, because I’ll be telling you all about our trip from Frigid Fargo to Balmy LA, and our adventures while there.

• We won’t be traveling around in a limo, or a convertible even, just a compact rental car;
• We aren’t staying in a luxury hotel, but we will be trying out AirBnB;
• We won’t be hitting too many touristy meccas, but we will be on the lookout for quirky or out of the way destinations. In fact, if you know us, you won’t be surprised to hear that we will be visiting at least one cemetery;
• We aren’t counting on running into any celebrities, but you never know, it IS LA after all!

Let me give you the backstory on how this whole idea came about…

As a very young child, my family lived in and around Pasadena, but my parents decided to relocate North to the relatively small town of Santa Barbara when I started school. We occasionally would go back to visit relatives still in LA, but my parents, having been locals, avoided that entire area during the holidays. So, even though my cousins attended UCLA, one of them even was a finalist for Rose Queen, the Rose Parade was something we watched on television, never in person.

Every year, as I watched the parade, I’d marvel at the spectacle and pageantry of those flower covered floats.  And every year I’d say to myself, ‘someday I’m going to decorate one of those.’ So, last year, as I pondered my Bucket List for 2013, I ran the idea of doing just that past Downtown Dad, and much to my surprise, he was all for it!

But how does one go about getting on a volunteer crew?

First, I found the Tournament of Roses Facebook page, and posted that question on their wall.  I was referred by more than one person to Beverly at Fiesta Parade Floats. An email inquiry to her was swiftly answered. She gave me a time line of events, and what I’d need to do, and when to do it. That was in January, and now, at last, I have the coveted “passes.”

In the letter that accompanied our passes, it says we are only required to sign on for one 6 hour shift. Well, we will be there for 6 days, so we’d really like to take on as many shifts as they’ll let us, you know, to get the feel of how it all works! But, we don’t want to spend the whole time working! We’ve identified a few places we must go, or must see.

• Neighborhoods in Duarte and South Pasadena I literally have not set foot in for half a century!
• Griffith Park
• The former site of my Grandpa “Doc” Hinkley’s Bowling Supply
• Mountain View Cemetery
• Those Hollywood Lights from those Hollywood Hills – or any scenario from Bob Seger’s Stranger In Town Album
• Disneyland/Knott’s Berry Farm/Universal Studios?

If you have any good advice on where to go/eat/stop/explore, please leave comments! Or, if you’re in the area, come meet us for a beer!

Let the adventures begin…

The Perfect Pie Crust

I’ve always thought that whatever filling happens to be between the layers in a pie, served only as the liquid to moisten the star of the whole pie show – the crust.

I must admit to having used frozen, mix and rolled pie crusts over the years, but as you might suspect, they were convenient, but lacking.

This year, I decided to put all of my creative efforts into making the Perfect Pie Crust – and I think I may have achieved it.

I read over and over that Lard was the essential ingredient for tender but flaky crust. I also wanted to use butter.  So with reckless abandon and with no regard to caloric count, I used half lard, half butter.  I think that may be the magic.

So, without further ado – here is what I consider to be the Perfect Pie Crust. This is enough for one two-crust pie, or two single-crust pies.

1/2 cup lard

1/2 cup butter

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon salt

5 to 7 tablespoons ice water

Mix butter and lard in a food processor, add salt.

Add 1 cup of the flour and pulse to mix

Add 2nd cup of the flour, pulsing till the mixture is coarse

Move the dough into a bowl, and add ice water 2 Tablespoons at a time, mixing gently with your hands just until the dough forms a dry ball.

Turn out onto a floured pastry board and gently roll to the size of your pie pan.

As you can see, we had to sample it first, just to make sure that it really was perfect. It could be that I also used the Perfect Apple Pie recipe which helped the pie crust achieve it’s own perfect-ness.  But that, my friends is another blog post.

A Small Apocalypse

 “I sat in the dark and thought: There’s no big apocalypse. Just an endless procession of little ones.”   ― Neil Gaiman, Signal to Noise

I have never shopped on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

At first, it was because that was never a tradition in my family and I was unaware that this was even a thing. Later, with a family of my own, it was because I barely had enough money to put a meal on the table, much less a Thanksgiving feast. Buying gifts would have to wait for the paychecks that would come in the month between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Also, maybe I’d taken the story The Gift of the Magi  too literally, but I had this crazy notion that a Christmas gift should be special, selected with that particular person in mind – certainly NOT an off-brand piece of electronics scored in a tussle with 1,500 other bargain-frenzied lunatics.

Now that I am older, (and yes, I’m aware that I sound like the crone on the porch hollering “Git offa my lawn”) year after year, I feel like our society devolves, and becomes more animalistic. The people who throng en masse, through the doors of some big box store seriously seem to be less than human, lusting not for the kindly spirit of giving, but for the carnal pleasure of battle.  And for what? They are not starving, or wrestling over the last drops of fresh water in the world. No, nine times out of ten they are gouging and scratching another human over a $10.00 item.

Watching video reports of the violent, senseless way shoppers surge through the doors, reminds me of scenes from movies about the end of the world, about some kind of apocalypse.  Webster defines Apocalypse as “A great disaster : a sudden and very bad event that causes much fear, loss, or destruction.” This herd shopping mentality does cause fear (at least in me) and certainly loss and destruction, but sadly, as in Neal Gaiman’s quote above, it is not sudden nor final. This kind of moronic mindless behavior repeats itself over and over, year after year, steadily chipping away at our civilization.

Our “traditional” family observance of Thanksgiving will happen over the weekend, as that is when all the members of our family will be together. Last night, Downtown Dad, Bobby and I had a non-turkey dinner at a restaurant, and as we drove home past the acres of parking lots teeming with cars, an infestation of bodies clambering to get through every store entrance, it was like we were witness to an apocalypse or maybe, more succinctly the annual Shopocalypse!

Old Fashioned Thanksgiving

The Pause Before…

Cocktails with dear friends after work, and on the drive home, this lovely piece of thanksgiving…

Mascot 101 – Chapter 2

It was decided at the last minute (this morning) to have Alfunz ride in the Xcel Energy Holiday Lights Parade (tonight) in an open horse drawn carriage with the Sanford Fargo Medical Center President and his wife.

I bribed  coerced  asked my faithful “handler” Max, if he could help me costume-up. Luckily he said yes, because there ain’t no way in hell I can get into that costume by myself! Plus we have this down to a science – the transformation only takes 5 to 10 minutes. Plenty of time for him to meet up with some friends beforehand then join me at 6ish for the 6:30 start time.

I set out after work and immediately found myself deep in the throng of parade float entrants trying to park, and spectators trying to get a good seat. Cops were directing traffic and it was looking like I was going to have to park blocks away, then lug the 50 pound “body bag” several blocks, in the dark. Luckily Downtown Dad waved me into a parking spot right behind the building where I’d be changing, which, magically, was right on the parade route.  I let Max know. He was happy to change his plans and meet me right away.

In case you don’t know, the temps in Fargo/Moorhead at this time of year can range anywhere from in the 50’s to double digits below zero. This evening it was a balmy 7 degrees above zero, with little to no wind. Before changing, I met my carriage mates, the medical center president and his wife, and other dignitaries, you know, Santa Claus. Since we’d be riding in an open carriage, I was pretty thankful that I would be wearing several layers of padding, costume, and fur feet and hands. Max arrived in plenty of time and true to form patiently pulled, pushed, zipped, snapped and belted me into the costume. All they while making me feel like I was dressing for a glamour shot, rather than strapping on a fat suit.  Nothing but encouragement from that Max!

We made our way outside, in the dark, to the carriage, which, once we looked at it, was pretty small.  There would barely be room enough for the President and his wife, let alone a 6 foot portly mouse! But we tried. I (Alfunz) experienced what it’s like to be “differently abled,” as people held my hands, and boosted me up, and tried to cram me into the tiny cabin. All that, then come to find out Alfunz wasn’t going to fit, so we reversed the process. I’m pretty happy that there were no pictures taken of that!

We decided (and by we, I mean the committee that had formed while stuffing me into the carriage – remember, I’m in costume and can only communicate by pantomime) that Alfunz should ride up front with the driver. Let me just say it is a good thing he was a skinny guy! The parade was about to start, so the committee hoisted and shoved and crammed again, this time in fast motion, and off we went. This parade was going to be just like Alfunz – “all fun from A to Z!”

I’m not sure what it looked like from the street, but here’s a taste of what I could see…

CeeCee, the horse (who I’m sure has a better side) was very well behaved. She hardly flinched at the sirens, and yells, and gunfire from the honor guard in front of us. And she only farted once!

Once the parade was over, and we gathered our bits and pieces and vehicles, we all went our separate ways.  I stopped at the liquor store for a well deserved treat…

Once again, nothing but encouragement from that Max.

Mascot 101 or What Do You Mean That Mouse Can’t Talk To Me?

Somehow, I’ve inherited the role of portraying Alfunz, the Sanford Children’s mascot.

That’s me, er… um, him on the right, next to Thundar, the NDSU Bison Mascot. Please be aware –  Alfunz is not a mouse, he’s a Peekador. Click on his name if you’d like to read his bio, and find out exactly what a Peekador is.

Today, we, er Alfunz got together with some NDSU football players to walk through the Children’s hospital delivering some gift bags.

It is a great opportunity to be Alfunz. You get to hug kids, and walk around giving high fives and dancing at community events.

Yeah, he’s adorable! But let me just say it is not all fun and games. Its also hot, confining, claustrophobic and you can’t hear or see much of anything when you have the costume on.

Luckily, I have a great co-worker/friend who acts as my “handler.” Since the only air/visibility opening is in the mouth, my handler has to tell me when people are near, and whether they are on the right or left, and if they are waving, or wanting to shake hands, or hug or dance. No small feat, to do inconspicuously, while at the same time, loud enough for me to hear!

To successfully take on the role of mascot, you must actively and energetically become that character. I’m not sure why, at 55 years old, I’m the one hopping and prancing around in a 50 pound fur suit, when there are plenty of people half my age who could do it much better. Maybe I need the attention, maybe I’m just a glutton for punishment.

I got my start in Mascottery (my made up word) about 30 years ago in Seattle. The AAA Auto Club where Downtown Dad and I worked, brought in the Flintmobile as an entry in the SeaFair parade, to promote seatbelt usage. Along with the vehicle, which really ran, came big full body fur costumes for Fred, Wilma, Dino. Barney and Betty. Of course I chose to be Betty!

But that’s where the glitz and glamour end.  The SeaFair parade is held in July, probably the only month in Seattle where the temps go above 72.  On this day, it must have been in the upper 80s.  And we weren’t the first people to wear these costumes, oh no! Not by a long shot. When we opened the wooden shipping crates that held each costume, we were nearly bowled over by the smell of sweat, wet fur, mildew, and some kind of terrible orange “air freshener” they had apparently been doused with after their last use before slamming the crate lid on them. Hanging the costumes inside out overnight helped some, but not nearly enough.

One of the rules of conduct when wearing a mascot costume is that while you are in costume, you give up your own personality, and individuality and transform yourself into that character. Your walk changes, your gestures change, your whole demeanor changes. You are first and foremost a larger than life entertainer.  But most importantly, you must Never EVER talk. Your only means of communication is through pantomime. Even if you are being mobbed by 150 children who very nearly sweep you into the crowd of spectators, you mustn’t scream, swear, or make any growling noises.

Also very important in the Mascot Code of Conduct is that no one should ever see the character transformation, or any part of your skin. You must change into and out of your costume in complete private.  Even though the combination of mildew, and Orange air freshener is searing your throat and lungs, and the sweat that is pouring off of your forehead into your eyes has nearly blinded you.

Today’s adventure wasn’t as grueling, although I did wish I hadn’t forgotten to wear my sweatband as we posed for pictures in several toasty hospital rooms. But the big grins on those little kids faces more than made up for a little discomfort!

The Emptying Nest

For the last 32 years, I’ve been a mom. OK, what I mean to say is that for the last 32 years I’ve been doing laundry.  Laundry that isn’t my own. Laundry that requires sorting, and special pretreating, and includes sometimes removing – let’s face it – some pretty gross substances from fabric.

You’d think as the kids got older, it would get easier, but somehow not only did the amounts of clothes increase exponentially, but the gross substances, got grosser and harder to remove from the fabric. And somehow the time it took to do the laundry increased exponentially as well. Nothing, I thought, would make me happier than reducing the amount of clothes I had to wash each week.

Over the years, I took to calling the pile of clothes that accumulated near the washing machine, Mount Laundry.  Sometimes scaling Mount Laundry took most of the week, only to have the mountain rebuild itself seemingly with every step I’d take.  By the time I got to washing my own clothes, it was usually late Sunday night before I’d have to be dressed and pressed for work the next morning.

Not only did it take forever to get everything washed, dried, ironed and folded, but inevitably, there were always mismatched items – socks mostly. I know this is a common occurrence, but it was that one thing that seemed to be the most frustrating thing about laundry.  Orphaned socks.  I used to think I’d rejoice if I ever washed and dried a load of laundry where every sock came out cleaned and dried along with it’s mate.

This week, as I folded the last load, I was surprised to find 12 socks, each with it’s own matching mate. I have to admit, I sat down and cried a little bit.