Personally, I do not pea… but the husband is a huge fan so when hams are on sale for Christmas and I’m left with a bone, there’s only one thing he wants.
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Split pea soup. Which happens to be the easiest soup to make… so it’s hard to refuse even though I can’t stand the smell or taste.
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5 hours later ? A pot full of slop with the consistency of sludge as far as I’m concerned.
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But the husband is in leftover pea heaven, and hey… I have to throw him a bone now and then.
A few more chuckles from our recent power outage during the storm.
When you live in Maine, you own lobster cooking pots.
And when the power is out for a day and a half due to a monster winter storm, you use your fireplace for heat. This burns copious amounts of wood, which results in copious amounts of ash. And when you can’t find your old ash bucket?
You improvise.
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With a lobster pot.
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Which worked remarkably well.
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Though I probably should have dug a little deeper in the closet for the larger one.
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And speaking of improvising…
The wire mesh curtain that slides across our fireplace is a wonderful thing. It keeps sparks and small pieces of wood from jumping out and burning down our house. In other words, it’s important.
Ours has always been temperamental and must be slid with care, something my husband naturally ignored. He tugged and pulled and ripped all day which resulted in half of the metal strip that holds the curtain in place to come crashing down.
His solution?
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I think you know me well enough to realize this will not be tolerated for long.
We will start and end this post with photos of His Lordship.
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Seen here giving me the evil eye for lowering the blinds and blocking his morning sun.
I had a birthday recently… yay me, another trip around the sun and straight down the road to decrepitude.
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The husband told me to pick a place for dinner but I’d skipped lunch and decided we should go cocktail hopping early.
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Enter Royal River Grille, one of my favorite spots.
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We settled happily at the bar… but were presented with brunch menus since it was a Sunday. I’m not a breakfast person so the thought of scrambled eggs with my Cosmo at 4:00pm did not please me, not one little bit. Brunch until 5:00pm? Come on.
We decided to move on and got the check.
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With tip, $30.92 for a drink and a beer. What’s the world coming to?
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Next stop was Goodfire Brewery, a new place I’d been wanting to try. On arrival we discovered they were almost out of beer and only had three left on tap. Thankfully one was a blackberry currant sour, but at $9.50 per for the small pour and a virtually non existent menu, we paid $24 for two beers and moved on again.
We ended at a nice seafood place we hadn’t visited in a while and I had a lovely crab, shrimp and scallop lasagna which I didn’t photograph.
So we end with me another year older and a very innocent Lord Dudley Mountcatten.
I’m sure I’m not the only who’ll be complaining today as it seems the entire United States was slammed by what they called a bomb cyclone event yesterday.
The wind? Insane. It gusted almost 70mph at our house.
The rain? A deluge that flooded roads, businesses, and homes.
Our nightmare started yesterday at 8:00am just as I was about to step into the shower. Bam! No power. Which meant no shower, sandwiches for lunch and dinner and an epic 13 hour gin rummy tournament by flashlight. Temperatures during the day were mild with a high of 52 degrees, but by nightfall it was frigid.
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Thankfully we have a fireplace…. and while it won’t heat the whole house, it did manage to keep the living room at 58 degrees when the outside temperature dropped to 7. Of course my husband the Marine runs the operation.
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Which means throwing giant logs on the top to get it truly blazing.
This does not always end well.
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Because sometimes the logs revolt and pop back out. Giant cloud of smoke, sparks that burned the carpet? You betcha!
But as we sat in the dark enjoying the smell of smoke and scorched Berber, the fun was just beginning. Yes, just as we were about to call it a day and go to bed… shingles started lifting and literally flying off the roof. We watched them sail into the backyard, the neighbor’s driveway and the road. Good times!
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Or not as it turns out.
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Five new leaks as of this morning.
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Did I mention Lord Dudley Mountcatten is utterly terrified of the fire? Positively and absolutely. He fled to the furthest reaches of our bedroom and cried nonstop. Which meant instead of sleeping on the relative warmth of the living room couch, I had to snuggle his highness in the frigid bedroom all night and got no sleep whatsoever because to top it all off? Our neighbor’s wood stove caught fire at midnight.
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Thankfully no one was hurt.
It’s 1:00pm now and we’ve been without power for 29 hours. I haven’t slept nor showered and just discovered it’s not easy to make tea and toast in a fireplace. I have to say …. I’m more than ready to fill the house with electric current. This pioneer woman thing is getting old.
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Here are a few pics I grabbed from friends.
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Our little downtown park.
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Not sure if you can tell, but the water is right under the bridge.
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Yikes!
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You’re looking at a pier and a parking lot. Or rather, you should be.
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We may be cold, dirty and hungry… but I’m still glad we don’t live there.
Put a Marine and a sailor together at a military museum and there are going to be some serious disagreements.
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But they’re friends, so it’s all good.
As was the collection of pins from the Vietnam era.
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Kill a Commie for Christ is probably not what Jesus had in mind.
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My husband’s father was a SeaBee, though in an earlier war. Looking at their mascot made me wish I had a few more arms. Dinner prep would be so much easier.
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As I said before, all the items in this museum are donated. Though why someone wanted them to have dirty underwear and a partial denture I’m sure I don’t know.
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This uniform parade was a little creepy, especially the headless model.
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That’s an exact replica of a cell at the Hanoi Hilton, right down to the inch.
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And the rats and bugs.
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Impressive roof patterning. wish I could talk the husband into doing that on ours.
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Our friend, pointing out his photo from his time in Bosnia.
There was so much to see and take in at this little museum.
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The husband with two of his old work colleagues taking about some kind of gun. 62 years of Army, Navy and Marine Corps service represented right there.
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The Nazi flag came from a soldier who liberated Auschwitz.
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This flag flew during the Normandy invasion.
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A wall of WWII Life magazines. It will not surprise you to learn my husband has them all.
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There’s a story for this fellow with the strategically placed leaf…
Of all the uniforms that have been donated and are on display at the museum, a WWII era French officer’s is not among them. All they have so far is a hat, so this poor guy is doing what any self respecting Frenchman would do while he waits…. drink wine on a nude beach.
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You have to wonder why S/Sgt. Towers kept these particular souvenirs from his war years. Good memories… or bad?
The husband and I were invited to a fundraiser at the Maine Military museum by an old friend who worked with him at the FAA.
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There were numerous items for sale, as well as a silent auction, 50/50 raffle and donation box.
There was also free food, beer and wine.
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You have to love a museum with a bar.
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The museum itself is small but jam packed with memorabilia, all acquired through donation. I’m amazed that we never knew it existed but seriously glad we do now.
We strolled around for an hour and could have spent all day. The collection of military history was impressive and the passion project of one single man. We tagged along on a portion of a tour with him and were blown away by the encyclopedic knowledge he had of every single piece in the building. As you can imagine, most of the stories were heartbreaking.
No, I didn’t buy myself a gift, but it seems someone did.
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It may be the most magical time of year, but it’s also the most popular time for criminals to hack your credit card.
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Thankfully my bank was right on top of it, cancelling the card and refunding the bogus charges. The amounts were low but that’s how they start, hoping you won’t notice. Ironically it was the fact they made multiple low purchases at the same place for the same amount that tripped an alarm. Weirder still? My last legitimate charge was $18.96.
Be careful out there. Being without my debit/Mastercard for a week until the new one arrives is a pain in the *ss this time of year.
I have a friend who does a different type of Christmas tree every year. Some years it’s weird and funky, some years it’s traditional. This year I made a suggestion I wish she would have followed…
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She was not amused, but damn. That’s epic.
Every couple of years the lazy Susan cabinet in our kitchen goes off track…. and every few years my husband asks why we need so many cans.
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Someday I’ll have an answer.
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I need this in my life.
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Who needs pie when you have martinis?
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Isn’t it sweet my cat loves rocks as much as his human mother?
And finally, a Christmas tree for Mark who has an affinity for awkward pink birds….
River's world..... 