strangetreat

I started typing this as a Facebook status and as it went on and on and on like a Freddie Mercury chorus I realized it was long as the day is long and should really be a blog post.


So.

Here we are.

It's been a long and busy week. Some health problems among family members that were scary, but seem to have turned out OK--in that treatment and occured and the person is feeling much better.

Friday I took a half day off work and my chumsketeer Markisan came out to the Wastes for a visit. We went to a new brewery called Solemn Oath, where we drank tasty ales with names like Butterfly Flashmob and Ravaged by Vikings. It was a much-needed change of pace. We took a growler of Ravaged by Vikings to go and got more hammered than Thor back at my sleeping hole.

Later, there were birthday festoons for another dear friend. We returned to the Wastes quite late.

I got up early and made a grocery list and did the shopping, cleaned a bit and then made some meals for the ill relation mentioned above. I made a macaroni and cheese with seven cheeses, sun-dried tomatoes, orange bell peppers and spinach. And a pot of matzo ball soup, and a chicken dish with grilled onions and apples in an apple cider and apple-cider vinegar reduction, served over noodles with fresh green beans sauteed with tomatoes, garlic, and basil. Then we drove up north to deliver these foodstuffs and to visit a bit.

We then planned to go to Lincoln Park Zoo to see the Christmas lights and the beasts.
Never actually made it to the zoo. It was way too packed and by the time we fought through the crowds to get in, there wouldn't have been time to see much. So we made the best of it and went to see the Daley Plaza decorations and the Field's windows. We will try for the zoo a different day. Crowds abound because it's so freakishly warm out. I guess most people are happy about the mildness, and I suppose that this is a blessing for all the people who are on the street this winter.

But speaking for myself only, I find the spring-chicken weather a bit disappointing. The cycle of seasons has purpose. I like to see them change. My favorite seasons are the transitional ones, the times of visible transformation--Autumn and Spring. It's lovely to have sultry days fat with low hanging fruit and blossoms unfolding amid the leaves of grass in summer.

But it is also lovely to make angels in ice and huddle together in the dark of winter with steaming cups and thick wool socks and crackling fires. All things have their own flavor and I want to lick every bit of life. Even the more temperate day, lovely of lovelies gets old after a while. It's nice for a while but then one get's antsy--I mean--shouldn't it DO something? Can we have some thunder please? Or a deep fog, or a blanket of snow? Is there nothing to learn from winter? Is there nore just as much to savor in the hushed dark cold as there is in the bright, bright sunshiney day?

Honestly .... Isn't summer the annoying excessively perky cheerleader of seasons? Can't summer just shut up for a few minutes so we can think? Indeed. If I wanted it to be warm all the time--I'd live someplace where it's warm all the time. So, as the master said, "Blow wind! Crack your cheeks! Blow rage blow!"