Beating my head against the monitor

Either I'm a complete computer klutz, or our computer is a dinosaur. I suspect it's a bit of both. It seems 'Hello' downloads as an '.exe' file, which our Mac has never been able to deal with. So much for that method of posting pics. Not sure what else to try. Maybe another photo hosting site. But I think soon we will have another computer, a laptop PC that will give us more abilities. Tim and I have decided that will be our Christmas present to each other this year.

On the plus side, I have two chocolate fruitcakes baking in the oven. The smell has just made it down to this end of the house. This is the one recipe I will not share. Yes, it's a highly doctored recipe that has been published in an old cookbook, but it's my own creation. I'm not sure why I feel this way about this particular thing. Fruitcake gets such a bad rap around the holidays. It's normally just a joke. This fruitcake is no joke. I've redeemed it. Redolent of chocolate, booze, and orange peel, it gets some pretty favorable reviews around the holidays. American Spoon has a chocolate fruitcake we tried years ago, and I decided it was too pricey and too far to drive to find it...so I made up my own.

Another success story: Toffee! I haven't tried to make toffee in 10 years. I got so disgusted with the last time I tried, I just didn't bother again. I rolled up my sleeves, calibrated my candy thermometer, and made some last week, and it actually turned out. Patience is the key. The only thing is, the chocolate topping didn't stick to the surface (it's a bit greasy), and fell off when I broke it up. Well, the obvious answer to that is to break it up first, and then cover the pieces with chocolate. Armed with an industrial 4-pound pack of butter, plenty of sugar and chocolate in the house, let the experimentation begin...

Still have so much Christmas stuff to do yet. The tree lies in pieces all over the living room floor, the cedar roping and wreath lie covered with a layer of snow on the porch, and there is nothing in the window boxes yet. My mental Martha Stewart list is woefully incomplete. I'm hoping it will warm up just a little so I can go out and clip some pine branches to fill the window boxes and get outdoor decorations up. Shopping isn't done yet. Wrapping isn't done yet. The house is filthy. Guess a lot of it will have to wait until my days off work. I took almost the entire week of Christmas off, something I don't think I've ever done before. One way or another, everything I want to have done *will* get done before we have our big dinner here on the 26th. Dammit.

It would be a lot easier to get crap done if I didn't get a headache every time I have a day off work, or get so sleepy every other day when I come home I nod off on the couch. The cold I caught (and have now graciously passed along to Tim) on the way home from California didn't help my multi-tasking abilities, either. And what the hell happens to the days? We were just picking the last of the tomatoes in the garden, and putting away the patio furniture, and now it's less than two weeks to Christmas.

Oh well, enough pissing and moaning. Maybe it would help to remember there are plenty of people out there who won't even HAVE a Christmas.