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in article , Melba's
Jammin' at wrote on 12/24/04 3:44 PM:

> On the
> way home, Chris and I will check out the Christmas lights -- there's a
> real monstrosity not far from us here in beautiful Burnsville. Worthy
> of Christmas Vacation.

I did that last night with my "elderly" friend. Of course, I say that in
quotes because, while she may be 74 years old, chronologically, she is
younger than many her age, and younger than some 45 year olds I know, too!

It's our annual tradition. We go out for a bite to eat and she gets her Xmas
gifts. (I get mine from her on Chanukah) Then we drive around looking at the
gawdy decorations! It's fun. We both felt like pizza. So we went to the
best darn pizza place in town, a few blocks from my apartment. It's mostly
takeout, but they have a handful of tables. We ate there. Big wood burning
brick pizza oven right there, behind the counter. Pizza takes maybe 8-9
minutes to bake, I can't even imagine how many degrees it is! You can smell
the wood burning when you drive up to the place. Awesome, thin crust pies.
We had our usual...a medium pie, half pepperoni (for her) and half sausage
and mushroom (for me). Shared a small salad so we'd feel virtuous.

Then, we drove around. One house had EVERYTHING on it. God Bless America in
red, white and blue. Merry Christmas. Animated reindeer. Inflatable snowmen
and Santa. Red and white candy canes made of lights lining the driveway. A
creche made entirely of lights. The 3 wise men, illuminated from within.
Hanging from the lit trees were some snowflakes made of lights, I can't even
remember what else. EVERY holiday icon known to man was in that front yard,
and plenty of them! Thing is, some of the houses like that look "thrown
together", a couple of them, though, looked really well-planned and were
actually sort of beautiful. I couldn't help but think "I'd hate to get
their electric bill" though.

Tonight is Xmas eve dinner with the family I had Thanksgiving dinner with.
I'm hoping it's ham, but I have no idea. And we'll exchange gifts.

Tomorrow, another gift exchange with another friend in the afternoon after
she does her family thing.

Then for supper tomorrow, I scored a bargain on a "turkey breast quarter"
(that's what it was labeled at the market. It's one side of the turkey
breast, with the wing). 69 cents per pound. I bought 3. One for tomorrow
plus leftovers, and 2 for the freezer for later on. Two of them cost about
$1.60. The other, not quite $2. That was a great bargain, because
Thanksgiving time they were about 3 times that price. That's why I bought 3.
I'm psyched! I bought a few sweet potatoes to bake and I'll have myself a
nice couple of meals out of this. Probably veggies and maybe stuffing. We'll
see what I feel like. I also have that wild rice from Meena-sota, so maybe
I'll do something with that and some dried cranberries. It goes so nicely
with turkey.

Sunday will be bargain hunting (I really need a Johnny Damon t-shirt and
they are having a big after Xmas sale!) and leftovers, then back to work on
Monday.