Life's Little Pleasures

Once December 25th is past, winter seems to take on a dull and wearisome air. The snow has melted down to a white icy crud. Most folks have stopped turning on their holiday lights and the seasonal concerts are over. The stores of course look like a tornado hit them with a modest little New Years display trying to remind us that's its not over yet. Sometimes I really do wonder if we have simply used up all our fun between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Then, just as I'm really developing a good funk, a wonderous sparkle of joy will pouch on me and tell me I'm just being silly. The snow storm here prevented mail delivery to my house from 12/19 until 12/26. So on the 26th I had a mailbox full of Christmas cards, birthday cards, letters and even a present. WooHoo !! Then on Monday morning when I came home from work (I had to work 12/25 evening thru 12/28 morning, which didn't exactly lighten my mood) there was a message on my answering machine from Missy, one of my rendezvous friends who lives in upstate New York. YeeHaw !! So I called her back that afternoon and we had a wonderful chat. So while the white icy mounds outside still pretend to be snow, and its still ugly damp cold here, and I have yet to get together with my Urchin for a birthday/Christmas/movie party, and a whole basket of Round Tu-Its are waiting for my attention here at the house, so what ? To everything its time.

Happy New Year to You One and All !!!!

Christmas Greetings - Kursk-Root Ikon at Church

First I want to wish a Merry Christmas to all my friends who are celebrating Christ's birth today. I hope you are having a wonderful time among your friends and family. May there be much joy in your life on this day. You are all in my thoughts. I'm working tonight but am off work for the Julian Calendar celebration of Christ's Nativity on January 7th. So today is a quiet day at home for me, with many little birds outside enjoying the seed and suet I put out this morning. I did drive over to Staunton Wednesday afternoon and stayed with my friends Nick and Katherine. We had a great dinner and talked of this and that - so I too spent a Christmasy time with friends.

This is the Theotokos of Kursk-Root on its ikon stand during the liturgy.

Yesterday on western Christmas Eve I was at church for liturgy in the morning for a very unusual reason. The Kursk-Root ikon of the Theotokos was visiting my parish church of All Saints of North America. This ikon was found in 1295 in Russia. It has 3 survived Tarter invasions, the burning of its monastic church home and the destruction of that same monastery by the Soviets. In 1921 in was smuggled out of Russia, it was in Serbia and other Balkin lands for a time, and then it was brought to the USA in 1951. Since then it has been honored and loved by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia. Currently it is being taken on pilgrimage as it were to the ROCOR parish churches of the eastern USA.

Here are the priests who served the liturgy. Fr. Michael on the far left is from the St. Innocent of Alaska Bulgarian Orthodox mission in Roanoke, Virginia and Archpriest Serge on the near left is from St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Howell, New Jersey. Fr. Serge is one of the clerymen bringing the Kursk-Root ikon to the eastern diocese parishes. He also accompanied it to Moscow and Kursk last September. Fr. Gabriel is holding the ikon and Fr. John is on the right. Fr. Gabriel and Fr. John are my parish priests.

This website has a synopsis of the parish visit and a YouTube video from the service. I'm one of the 6 people singing in the choir. There is also a link on this page to pictures from the service:
www.eadiocese.org/News/2009/dec/middlebrook.en.htm

For a brief history of the Kursk-Root ikon of the Theotokos:
www.eadiocese.org/News/2009/november/kurskicon.en.htm

A Joyous and Happy New Year to All.

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Happy 59th Birthday

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME !!!!!

Just what I wanted - a boatload of snow. In case I was feeling homesick for a real winter. Well I admit I miss ice fishing but I don't miss measuring snow in feet. Anyway, here my snug little house after the bodacious storm of yesterday.

Of course getting into my snug little house has its moments. Think I'll let the classic Virginia solar snow removal system clear the 3 feet of drifted snow from my front porch. Yes Virginia, there are steps up to the porch.

The back yard. Please note: there is only 2.5 feet of air from the bottom of the bird feeder to the snow. The feeder perches are level with my eyes.

The view from my kitchen door.

The foot path to my kitchen door.

The motorcycle rail trailer and shed wood.

It looks longer somehow - the distance from my kitchen door to my truck.

The driveway around the truck and out into the street is clear - now to clean off the truck.

Of course I don't exactly plan on going anywhere. This is Branchland Court looking towards the cul-de-sac turnaround and the neighbor's house. The neighbor with 4 wheel drive trucks. The trucks sitting in his cleared out driveway awaiting a plow to lower the snow so his 4 wheel drive truck's front bumper will clear the snow.

This is Branchland Ct. looking towards Westwood Dr. Its about 50 yards from my driveway to where the jacked up 4 wheel drive drive truck with very serious off road tires and chains got stuck around noon. The tracks are visible at the top of the photo. Branchland Ct. has several inches more snow than Westwood Dr.

Snow accumulation on my trash can. Don't think the trashman will be around today.

My GPS Says This is Virginia . . .

I think this snow storm used a Map Quest knock off. It obviously was headed for North Dakota and somehow got here through bad directions.

The view from my kitchen door at noon today.

The view up the driveway at about 2 pm.

The back yard at about the same time.

The view at 4 pm.
The snow in the street came to my knees when I went to check.

The snow on the spare tire on my motorcycle trailer measures 26 inches at this point in time. Notice that it is still snowing. Its going to keep this nonsense up for about 6 more hours.

My friend Jane wants to be in Texas about now. Me, I want to be retired so I could just wait it out and enjoy it. Note to Santa: Please send me a nice set of wood & rawhide beavertail snowshoes with a classic strap leather harness.

Advent: The Time of Preparation

Well its December 16th - Just 10 days before the Feast of the Nativity according to the New Gregorian Calendar. I finished my cards for my new calendar friends. Wrote a note in each card this year rather than do a letter-for-all. It was a very pleasant evening activity during Advent - I'd play Christmas music of one kind or another and write little notes to my friends. With a fountain pen of course. And green ink. I've also gotten the presents I need to mail wrapped, packed and ready to go. With a card and note in each. Written with a fountain pen. And green ink.

I did have to take down my little Hello Kitty Christmas tree - Skiddy and Pippen kept attacking the tree. Not the Hello Kitty figures mind you, but the tree. Tackled it, pounced on it, biffed it. I have no idea why they found it so in need of punishment. All 30 of my Hello Kitty figures are fine and none the worse for wear but I clearly need a cat free area for the tree. The tree is fine also and in protective custody.

Else I finished loading all my Christmas CD's onto my iPod. Then I went to Panera bread and spent an afternoon near their gas fire updating various programs on my laptop. So now the AGV, iPod, iTunes and WinXP are all up to date. I really should do this monthly instead of quarterly. I was there for 3 hours and didn't even get to checking for updates for my other apps. Also got all the routine chores done at the house so I'm ready to work on crafts and just enjoy the rest of the Holiday season. December is really a most excellent month.

Let It Snow - Let it Snow - Let it Snow

This is the scene that greeted me when I got up Saturday morning. Not much changed all day. Once it got dark the wet slushy snow turned to frozen crusty icy snow. Very unpleasant. Concerts were canceled, church services (including those at my parish) were canceled, and in general whatever was planned for Saturday evening didn't happen. The Malls even closed early. Not that this bothered me all that much. See I had planned to drive up and visit The Urchin Saturday evening through Sunday evening, but a change in The Urchin's Work Schedule necessitated a change in my visit schedule to Thursday evening through Friday evening. So The Urchin, D&D and I had a grand time. Urchin, Dolores and I went out to breakfast at the Amphora and then checked out the local pet supply store. Later on Urchin and I went out and got our hair styled. We even went to Tyson's Corner to check out the Holiday decorations, although that was a bit of a bust. Very sparse decorations, none of the wonderful displays in the concourse intersections that I remember at Tyson's in years past. I drove up and back on clear dry roads.

Of course we had to fuss over Urchin's kitten Wicket. He's gained half a pound in the last 2 weeks, which is very good. He has also learned how to wake up and immediately scamper at warp 9 all over everything in sight. In other words, he is a typical kitten with a corner on cuteness and a chainsaw purr.

He has also managed to wrap Don around his itty bitty paws. Mischief managed incarnate.

I did get out on Sunday, bought some Christmas cards and started in on them after dinner. May all my readers have a Wonderful Advent, a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year and a Joyous 12 Days of Christmas. Or if they prefer a Happy Chanukah or a Joyous Mid-Winter.

Advent Has Arrived !

Advent has arrived. This the season of harried shopping for many, free live musical concerts for some and joyous anticipation for we few, we happy few. I've been to UVA for 2 free concerts so far. Both were semester end presentations so they didn't feature seasonal music. They did feature baroque music so I was hardly disappointed at not hearing any carols. I've also worked with the horses on Tuesday, bought pet food, cleaned my kitchen, done the laundry, washed the dishes, finished scrubbing the kitchen walls, mailed 2 ebay sales, listed 3 more items on ebay, balanced my checkbook, sorted the Important Papers file, practiced some songs I'm working on learning and engaged in Buckskinner Stress Relief by throwing hawk & knife. Plus read some and slept. To top all that activity off I put up my kitchen Christmas Tree today. Yes friends, its decorated with battery powered mini LED lights and Hello Kitty figurines. Bunches of Hello Kitty figurines. Only the silver angel on top isn't a Hello Kitty item. So far the cats have ignored it. I also have an Advent calendar going. Urchin gave me a calendar of Church Saints (late 1400's through late 1700's western art) and it included an Advent Calendar. So everyday I get to open another little gold door and see if I can guess what Latin saint or feast it reveals. So far I've gotten 2 of 3 right. I've also learned that St. Sebastian is the patron of both upholsterers and policeman. Uh, right, go figure.