It’s beginning

So, where did November go, then?

OK, I know we were away for some of it, but really, doing a bit of shopping this morning made me realise that everyone else is a step or two ahead of me here.  I haven’t really got myself into a December frame of mind and yet others seem to be totally in the Christmas groove.

The first Christmas card arrived on Thursday, with sweet thoughts from Down Under.  We smiled though, because I’m meeting the friend who sent it for coffee in a couple of weeks, in London.  I think she reached the UK more quickly than the cards she posted.  I love getting letters and cards from far away though, and the envelope with the Aussie stamp will be a great start to my December Daily journal, won’t it?

Two more cards followed today, with new addresses and family news.  Meanwhile, the cards I began to make a couple of weeks ago remain unfinished on my worktable.  So much for getting a head start!

But it was in the shops where the real business was going on.  Seldom have I seen such a determined start to the shopping season.  No more gazing at the ridiculously early “seasonal” windows and out of place decorations, but heads down serious shopping with lists and the rest of the family trailing behind.  We are familiar with the American “Black Friday” sales from our trips over there which have frequently been during the fourth weekend in November, but it seems as though the event has crossed the Atlantic Ocean and for the first time here, we’ve seen some real bargains and those “deep discounts” we associate with US-style shopping.

Not that we went looking for such things, but some were hard to resist.  I’m not ready to begin buying gifts and haven’t even thought of filling stockings yet, but I was looking for a pair of boots.  Never my favourite things to buy, I was prepared for a lengthy search for the right ones so I was thrilled to find the perfect pair at 20% off, too.  A little further along in the same store, the eye make up I was after was also 20% off and the triple-points in Boots made the half-price item even more appealing.

So, there will be some exhausted shop assistants this evening, I’m sure.  One young Marks and Spencer employee in particular will be glad to finish his day, because at 8.45am this morning, he was finding it hard going on the food hall checkout and had to scan our shopping a second time because of the three bags full of things, only five items had scanned satisfactorily.  An impatient supervisor came over to see what was going on and brusquely reminded him that he must listen for the “beep” each time; it seemed as though we weren’t the first customers who had experienced a little delay.  I felt sympathetic towards the young man, who could see the queue building up and was clearly starting to panic, and felt that a busy Saturday morning such as this was not the best time to acquire his checkout skills.  I said as much to one of the long term staff as I passed her in a different part of the shop.  “Oh, yes, he is having a little trouble there”, she said.  “He could use a little support, especially since he’s been here since 4am this morning”.

I was glad to see her walk off in his direction, to “share a bit of love”.

Well, personally speaking…

“I found it rather invigorating”.

So said Diana, having spent a whole weekend here in chilly Gloucestershire with neither heating nor reliable hot water.  Suffice to say we will laugh about it later but at the time, it was a bit of a challenge to say the least.

That’s not to say we didn’t have FUN!

A fancy dress party where we all went dressed as we were aged 20 – tennis coach, flower child, student and beatle-lookalike, we blended in well with all those who didn’t have quite so many years to remember!

Then, on the way to lunch in Cheltenham, the crowds assembling provoked us to ask “what’s going on?”   The answer was forthcoming just minutes later.

Oh my goodness…the excitement!

We had prime viewing spots too – that’s Mary’s hair in the picture.  Of course, we were on our best behaviour and didn’t attract his attention, though some of us were sorely tempted…

But with our friends back at home now and the house returned to normal, there was the business of Christmas cakes to attend to.  With a new oven to fathom, this wasn’t as easy as it might have been.  Still, the results look pretty good, if I say so myself, even if I did have to get out of bed at 11.45pm last night to take them out of the oven!

OK, time to go to work now.  It’s one of those non-stop weeks where every spare five minutes is a valuable commodity!

Home

We’ve been home a couple of days, doing our best to manage to keep warm in spite of a broken central heating system.  Not only that, but our immersion heater decided to call it a day too, so we’re having a pretty cool time here.

We had such a terrific few days in California, full of fun and non-stop activity.  As usual, I came home and opened my bags to find a whole lot of goodies I’d found along the way, taking the opportunity to stock up with heavily discounted supplies for my Silhouette cutting machine and a few extra ingredients for a couple of projects I have in mind.

Those “40% off everything” deals are hard to resist and a great chance to buy things like sewing machine needles which stuff into the corners of suitcases and take no room whatsoever.  It was my hero’s turn to have the TSA look over the contents of his suitcase this time, probably because he had quite a few of my things in there too!

Had they opened my suitcase, they’d have found a plethora of scissors!  Why?  Well, shortly before my birthday, I spotted a review of the new Fiskars Amplify scissors and added a pair to my wish list.  My wish was granted several times over, for I received both multi-media scissors and fabric shears too, in two sizes of each – lucky girl!  As they’re still not available over here yet, my hero had placed his order to arrive with Mary, who brought over a large box (or two) during our stay.  I’ve used the 6” multimedia shears with the short blade to open the packets of the other sizes with ease, having struggled to open the first package with my normal everyday pair of scissors.  Whilst I’m not at all sure how the “amplify” bit works, I can say that it really does make a difference and I’m delighted with this, the very last present from my birthday, a month ago.

We’re celebrating another birthday this evening, going to a party dressed as we were when we were twenty.  Oh my.  Suffice to say, I’ve just darned my college scarf!

We were Kings

Our last night in LA and definitely one to remember.  Ellis had got us all tickets for the hockey match at the Staples Center.

The LA Kings were playing the Tampa Bay Lightnings and since this was the first ice-hockey match I’d been to, I didn’t really know what to expect apart from some fast and furious action.

We had great seats and as we watched the teams warm up on the ice, we thought that it might be good to look out for a particular player.

Once more, a gift of a quote for my blog was uttered: “Let’s support number 10, because he’s cute and he still has teeth”.

(as good a reason as any, wouldn’t you agree?)

So, Richards was our man then, and his return to the ice was noted now and again, “Oh look, our cutie-pie is back”.

The men ensured we were well supplied with snacks.  Deep fried popcorn chicken, hand cooked potato chips and bags of sweet-salt popcorn too. 

The match was indeed fast and furious, but what was particularly amusing was that there was not a single lapse in the action.  Fuelled by loud music, cheering, chanting and non-stop sponsor-led activity such as throwing T shirts into the crowd, the “kiss cam”  or the drawing of a lucky ticket, there wasn’t a minute’s quiet.

Oh, and there was frequent clearing of ice, by huge machine or by hand, when a handful of people skated up and down with large snow-shovels.  The young bikini-topped women seemed to enjoy the task, in spite of the chill.

Best of all, “our” team won, 5 – 2.  After each goal the Kings scored, the home crowd went wild and given that there can have been no more than a handful of Tampa supporters in there, the noise was phenomenal.  When Tampa scored their two goals there was little more than a whimper, possibly a low “boooo” but certainly no fuss beyond the minimal announcement.  Were we all biased?  You bet we were.

So yes, we were indeed all Kings.  We left as the team mascot Bailey the lion skated onto the ice, wearing a rather familiar guise in honour of the month of Movember, too.

Go Kings, go!

“OK, let’s hit the grave and go shopping”

I whipped out my notebook and scribbled down those words so I could include them here, of course, but I won’t embarrass anyone by telling you who said it!

We headed out for the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library this morning.  After we’d paid the local JoAnns and Michaels a visit, that is.  Well, with coupons burning a hole in my purse, I couldn’t neglect my favourite places, could I?

The Ronald Reagan library is just up the road from our friends’ home, in the Las Posas hills.  A fine bronze of the man himself stands by the entrance which wasn’t quite as surprising as what was just inside…

A Christmas tree!  Surely, too early for such things?

We went inside and found the story of the 40th President’s life rather interesting, though there were some significant omissions which needed a little Google research later.  As usual, I found the personal items offered an insight to the man himself and I must say, he came across as a very sweet and romantic chap!

How’s this for a cute telegram to Nancy?  One of half a dozen or so exhibited there which revealed the strength of their relationship and their love for one another.  Actually, though Nancy featured large in this story, his first wife, Jane Wyman got no mention at all.

Another display was of the small index cards he used to reference short quotations for use in speeches later.  All written in tiny handwriting, they were meticulously ordered in an album and the display offered a clear view of several.

My favourite was “there’s just too much month left when the money runs out”

He was definitely the master of the pithy quote, as these two mottoes which stood on his desk in the Oval Office show.

Having seen them in the exhibit, we saw them again in the mock up of the Oval Office in the next room.

A little further on, I was fascinated to see the detail in his personal diaries, this page telling the story of Valentines day when he and Nancy watched “an amusing movie called Nine to Five”. All handwritten in his now-familiar, neat and tiny script, this must have taken an age to write.

His movements for the day were recorded on typewritten record sheets; the three above were for just one single day.  It seemed almost like a list of choreographic directions and clearly there was little “wriggle room”.

Upstairs, we walked along a balcony around the most talked-about exhibit of all, Air Force One.

The huge plane was placed in front of huge picture windows, overlooking the unspoiled Californian landscape outside Santa Susana mountains, where a red-tailed hawk swooped and soared in the sunshine.  We made our way to the entrance, graciously declined the offer to have our photograph taken waving in Presidential style at the doorway and went inside for a look.  Very impressive – but smaller than one might imagine.  There followed a short look inside Marine One, the Presidential helicopter and the remainder of the exhibit.  But we were getting hungry and the story of the Cold War and an exhibition about Spies didn’t really capture our imagination so we hot footed it up to the cafe for a spot of lunch.

After which, the now infamous words were spoken.  “OK, let’s hit the grave and go shopping”.

So we did.

What a great day!