Stan’s Obligatory Blog

Tonight, Lucinda and I got a Christmas tree for our house, and we decorated it. And we had some fun doing it.

Because our family is fragmented now, Lucinda wanted to do a Thanksgiving dinner with me here. So today was our day. I picked her up at 1:00 and we came home to make it. We made cornbread stuffing, snow-white potatoes au gratin, kale, and a cornish game hen. We also made a chocolate bundt cake with the recipe from the Hershey’s cookbook. It was all quite good.

This week finds me with a lot more free time than usual, owing to the holiday yesterday and various other things. So over the weekend and yesterday I made the final push to the summit in my project to repaint the living room. This was the last room in the house that hasn’t been painted since we bought it in 1995.

I started this project back in April, and I’ve been slowing grinding along through it. And Saturday I decided to go for it. I painted the entire dining room, including moving the giant china cabinet. That was a big project.

Last night I finished touching up the yellow along the border where it meets the red and installed a molding along the transition. Then Lucinda and I hung the pictures back up on the walls.

And here is the result.

This afternoon we got some rain. The first rain of the season here in L.A. So Lucinda put on her coat and went outside to stand in it. Rain is a novelty around here.

It was gray and dreary all day, so it seemed like a good day to be cooking. I made short ribs with lentils and rice for dinner, and I also made an apple pie. It was an experiment, since I used Granny Smith apples this time, instead of the Fujis that I’ve used before. I think I like the texture of the Fuji apples better. I also tried making the crust in the food processor, instead of by hand with the pastry cutter. That was a whole lot easier. I also experimented with decorating the top of the pie with shapes cut from crust dough scraps. It was a good pie.

On Friday night, I took Lucinda and her friend to see the fireworks show in South Pasadena. We’ve been to this before, and it’s usually a pretty good show.

We got there and took our places on the artificial turf. That was a little weird. Sitting on fake grass that had fake dirt underneath it. The fake dirt was made of ground-up tires. So it was a totally un-natural experience. But it was soft and pretty comfortable. So I guess that’s just how it goes.

The show was good. They didn’t waste any time. As soon as it was dark, they started up. And right after the climax at the end, the lights came on, and everyone went home. No wasted time or motion.

It was a fun time.

This morning, when I dropped Lucinda off at school, this is what I saw from the playground at the school.

The fire in Santa Anita Canyon was crossing a ridge about 2 miles away. It was a bit unnerving to see actual flames on the mountain that close to the school. But the word tonight is that they are gaining ground on the fire, and school will be open tomorrow. So I guess that’s a Good Thing.

Lucinda is home sick from school today, and I’m home with her. So we went out in the back yard to check on the baby hummingbird. It’s getting more feathers, and it pretty much fills the nest. Since I’m getting a pretty good collection of photos, I made a separate album for them: http://www.1134.org/gallery/hummingbird

She’s nine now. The party was Saturday. Pictures are in her photo album:

http://www.1134.org/lucinda/photos

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Today’s plan was that Lucinda and I were going to go see the final stage of the Tour of California over at the Rose Bowl. But it was raining today. The race was still on, but standing outside in the rain all afternoon just didn’t seem like it would be all that much fun. So I talked to Lucinda, and we decided to go to Musink. We brought along her friend Alisha, since she’s also an “L.A. Ink” fan. I took them to visit the High Voltage Tattoo shop in Hollywood last month.

We got down there at about 1:30, and it was already hopping. It was the biggest crowd I’ve ever seen on a Sunday afternoon at a tattoo convention. We stashed our jackets under the table at my friend’s booth and set off to wander around. They had a sign up at the High Voltage booth that said that Kat, Kim, and Hannah were going to be greeting fans at 5:00. We talked to the people in the booth and asked them what time we should plan on getting in line, and they said 4:00.

We wandered over to the vendors’ building, and Lucinda and Alisha both got little glitter temporary tattoos. I also stopped off at the Burning Angel booth just to show Lucinda’s second-grade school ID to Joanna Angel. In her picture, Lucinda had a bright red streak in her hair, just like Joanna has now. She thought that that was very cute.

Back in the tattoo building, we saw Kim at one of the booths, so we stopped to talk to her and get a picture with her and the girls.

By this time, it was about 3:30, and a line was already forming to meet Kat. So we got in line. The sign had said she would be out at 5:00, but she came out earlier, since the line was so long. We all got our pictures with her, and she also signed Lucinda’s shirt that we’d bought last month when we visited the shop.

After all that excitement, we went back to the vendors’ building and Lucinda bought a set of makeup brushes, and I got a print from Matt Kotch, who is an artist who does paintings of weird sea creatures.

By the time we left, it was time for dinner, so we stopped off and ate before heading home.

It was a fun time.

Lucinda had so much fun playing in the snow last Monday that we had to do it again today. We went back to the same place, and she brought another friend along. They played hard for a long time, until it was starting to get dark and we had to go home.

Pictures are in her photo album.