Relevant but non-Halloween Updates

[afterallthistime]

Last night my husband and a friend of ours trekked out to Salem, MA for Halloween festivities and had a fantastic time. However, I am now "stranded" at my folks' house until 2 am and don't have my camera or free use of the computer, so a post about Halloween will ahve to wait until tomorrow.

For now, here are some relevant, but non-Halloween pieces of news

1. On Saturday we had a freak snowstorm, and over 500,000 MA residents are still without power, including the district I work in. I sent in an absence notice for today before I left for Salem yesterday - needlessly, it turns out, since school was cancelled because most of my district is still blacked out. I got a call from our Reverse 911 at about 2:30 today telling me tomorrow's in-service day is cancelled as well, and the latest ETA for power restoration may be as late is November 3rd. I'm loving the time off right now, but I'll probably hate it in June (although by June I should have a different assignment (hopefully me old one back!) and might not mind it as much).

2. NANOWRIMO STARTS AT MIDNIGHT. And I have NO PLOT. NONE. BUT - I am excited, because planning has never really worked out for me, so maybe just winging it (having no expectations) will be good. I'm looking forward to it, anyway. As kind of a forewarning, for a good chunk of November, this blog might be kind of NaNo-centric, so I hope y'all don't mind listening to me ramble about my plot/lack thereof. Also, if anyone wants to follow me on the forums at NaNoWriMo.org, I'm PerfectMistake.

3. I'm excited to get my official discretionary budget for November, because there is a TON of stuff coming up that I want to go to (including Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Les Miserables, and Spamalot) and I'm going to buy some tickets. It'll be epic. Also, Andy is portioning out our holiday budget, and I get to buy the supplies for me holiday crafts and gifts ♥

4. Andy and I are hosting Thanksgiving for the first time this year. I'm nervous but also excited. Does anyone have any favorite Thanksgiving dishes they'd like to share? I already have a general idea of what I'm preparing, but I'm open to "twists" on some classics, or some interesting new dishes to try.

Signing off; Halloween pics and such to come. Hope anyone heading out to celebrate tonight has an awesome time!

Comments

[larivee22.livejournal.com]

Eric's cousins are still out of school, and many doctors offices / little clinics are still without power, which is terrifying and also, for my purposes, frustrating.

I like to cook bread-stuffed Italian peppers, we usualy bring them places in lieu of turkey. Linguini with squash sauce is also a good side sometime.

[sumofherregrets.livejournal.com]

My sister didn't get power back til today, and some friends in Nashua aren't expecting it til Thursday.

Stuffed peppers are interesting,I've never thought of them as a side before (but I do tend to make large ones and stuff them with heavy ingredients, smaller peppers and lighter stuffing might work). My step-mother-in-law also can't eat gluten, so I have to be a little more conscientious there, as well.

[larivee22.livejournal.com]

One thing about Menino, he keeps the lights on. These lengthy power outages were unheard of ten years ago, then the power companies decided they could lay people off and stop paying overtime. It's disgraceful the way these companies are hoarding money at the expense of the public -- and we as a people seem to have forgotten that we need to have x number of employees for damned good reasons.


There's probably a way to get around the gluten thing (Sarah Vowell uses cornbread, because she's an Okie and has celiac disease.) The ceep is on the Feast website somewhere, I think. For Eric and I, the peppers aren't a side per se, they perform the same function turkey would.