Let me preface this by saying I hate football. There. I’ve said in front of everybody.

I don’t get it.

I don’t understand it.

A bunch of grown men run around and into each other (but never getting very far) before they fall on top of each other.

Minutes on the clock can turn into hours. Mere seconds can easily turn into 45 minutes.

Imagine if we could stop the clock on our own lives like that. Click : time stopped. Click : time restarted. I just turned three minutes into 45 minutes! Wow! Think of all the extra living we could do over the years if we added them all up. We’d have so much extra time to spend living our lives.

With all that extra time I’d have on my hands I can tell you this: I would not spend it watching football.

I can’t wait for the Super Bowl because it means the end of football season. Finally other shows I have TiVo’d won’t have to extended by an hour or more just to make sure they fully record.

Still ... I guess I’m glad the Jets won.

The sun coming up in our woods the morning after our snowfall this week.

We’ve had snow on the ground now since the day after Christmas. First the blizzard snow of 20 inches, then last Friday’s 5 inches, and this week’s 7-incher that fell over Tuesday night. We never got rid of the first snow even though we had one warm day and a little bit of rain that helped melt some of the snow pack. Still, there’s an awful lot of snow still on the ground.

The temps hover in the 20’s during the day and at night plummet to the single digits and teens. The wind has been blowing quite nastily too so I haven’t really been taking the dogs for their daily walk. Today the wind is calm, so we did manage to get a walk in.

Bella likes it when I shovel and throw some snow her way. She thinks it’s fun and she hops around and barks. She’s bored because she can’t find any dirt to dig holes in. Thank God.

I haven’t been anywhere since Tuesday! At least not in a car. Only in the yard and a walk down our street today with the dogs. I’ve been reading, knitting (birthday present for neighbor Kim but I don’t think I’m going to finish in time) and watching my TiVo’s shows.

Rick has been on a bread kick lately. We recently bought this book:

So far we’ve made the french baguettes (last weekend) which turned out pretty well, and this whole wheat pizza dough. The pizza had a delicious wheaty flavor but the crust did not get crispy like we like it. It was really good though! Don’t you think it looks good?

And, he has another dough for a ciabatta resting in the fridge for this weekend. So far that’s our only plan for the weekend. It’s supposed to snow a little tomorrow so we’ll probably spend the day sitting around the wood stove while the lovely aroma of baking bread fills the house.

Hope you have a great weekend no matter what you have planned (or not)!

How many people can say they’ve seen an Emmy up close and personal? Or held one?

Last week Rick flew out to Las Vegas to attend the Consumer Electronics Show (more commonly known as CES) and to accept the Emmy for Vision Research alongside Andy Jantzen (the original founder of the company) at the awards ceremony at the Venetian hotel.

It’s not Rick’s Emmy; it’s the company’s. However, Rick has been working on getting them an Emmy for about three years now. He lobbied the committee to make a new category, and they did. He worked really hard to make it all happen and I’m just as proud of him as if it were his own Emmy, since without him they might not have won it, deserving as they were of one.

He carried her on the plane coming home and we were both amazed that security didn’t even blink an eye. I mean, after all, she could be a serious weapon! Her bottom is filled with lead (hey, also a good place to hide something from x-ray?) and her wing tips are so sharp they could put someone’s eye out or puncture an important body part. No matter—she went through with flying colors as if they see one every day. I can’t imagine they are too common!

It was love at first sight. She’s beautiful. She’s easy to hold and grasp around her slim waist. She’s heavier than I expected and quite a bit larger.

Here is a small part of the history behind her: “After rejecting 47 proposals for what was to become the Emmy® statuette, Academy members in 1948 selected a design that television engineer Louis McManus had created using his wife as a model. The statuette of a winged woman holding an atom has since become the symbol of the Television Academy’s goal of supporting and uplifting the arts and science of television: The wings represent the muse of art; the atom the electron of science.*” If you want more information you can find a short history (where I lifted these words from) here and a longer article here.

The inscription on her base reads: “Presented to Vision Research (an Ametek® Company) For Phantom Super High Speed Slow Motion Camera & Recorder System with HD Playback For Super Slo-Motion HD Systems For Acquisition, Recording and Playback of Broadcast Entertainment and Sports Productions.”

To understand more about the cameras and why they are so Emmy-deserving you can read this press release on Vision Research’s site.

We were to take her with us to Rick’s holiday party on Saturday night where I thought we’d be turning her over to Andy. We packed her up in her beautiful presentation box (used as a backdrop for the very first photo) and into the padded hard case Rick had carried her on the plane in, stowed her in the trunk and off we went. When we arrived at the party venue they had valet parking. We both got out of the car and Rick handed the valet the keys. As he drove away I looked at Rick and said “Oh NO, we’ve left the Lady in the trunk!” Did we ever get some strange looks from the people around us! He managed to stop him before he got too far and rescued the Lady (as I had come to call her so far) from the freezing cold.

She adorned the cocktail area with her loveliness and people gathered around to stare, take photos and finally to ask if they could please lift her up. She complied with all their requests. When it was time to move to where dinner was being served, we polished her up with a soft cloth and put her back in the box. Once upstairs we took her out again and placed her on a table all by herself next to the DJ. Once she was done with her part in the speeches of several bosses (whereupon she allowed herself to be held up and admired) she was put back on her table.

But she was never alone. A steady stream of people came to pick her up and have their photos taken with her. Our table was closest to hers and we kept a sharp eye on her throughout the night. When is became obvious that Andy was not coming and she would be coming home with us once again, the responsibility started to weigh heavily on us both. Maybe it’s because we had just watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy again over the Christmas holidays, or maybe it’s because she is truly magical, but we could both feel the pull of her sitting on that table even when we weren’t glancing over there to make sure she was still in her place. She was commanding us to watch over her. We felt connected to her.

OH NO! We had become — (are you ready?) — the Emmy-Bearers. We had become to Emmy what Frodo was to the Ring. But instead of being on a mission to destroy her, we had the responsibility of delivering her safely and unharmed to her rightful owners.

As the night wore on those feelings of being bound to her only got worse. Pretty soon I was wringing my hands and calling her “my precious.” Rick said if I started coughing and sounding like I was saying “gollum” he was leaving. When Rick’s boss’s boss brought her over and sat her between Rick and I, I snatched her up and starting crooning my precious, my precious  and everybody at our table burst out laughing.

Seriously though, she really did seem to be a burden of sorts, but not an unwelcome one. She now resides safely in her special Plexiglass case at Vision Research, where Rick is now the Emmy-Guardian instead of the Emmy-Bearer. He has taken to locking her up in his office at night for safekeeping. For being nothing but a mix of copper, nickel, silver and gold she casts a powerful spell over all who meet her. If you had the chance to meet her you’d understand.

Farewell, my precious! I’ll come by to see you again sometime soon.

*Taken from the website of the Academy of Television Arts & Science.

Inches of fresh new snow, that is. Winter arrived the day after Christmas and has not left! We still have several inches of snow (not to mention the piles where it was plowed/shoveled, etc) left from the blizzard. Now all that crusted-over snow has a fresh coating on top. It fell without any breeze or wind today. Very pretty! The only trouble was I was worried that Rick’s flight would be delayed since Newark is notorious for delays if anybody so much as sneezes, but that was not the case. His flight arrived right on time late this afternoon.

However ... I did have to look my fear right in the eyes and use the snowblower on Johnny to clear the drive. We have a system here: I mow; Rick blows. I’m not very good at the snowblowing gig, but I managed to make it work. I won’t have to do any leg lifts tonight as I got most of my exercise working the pedal to raise and lower the snowblower attachment. whew. But, I know if I have to I can get myself out of the house if Rick is not here. We have such a long driveway (and circular too) that it can be a challenge. Thankfully it wasn’t a huge snowfall.

And, for tonight, we have an Emmy in the house. I am talking a real-honest-to-god-Emmy sitting right here a foot away from me. Tonight when Rick brought it home I took it out of its padded box and held it. It’s heavy! And gorgeous! It’s not really ours. It belongs to the company that Rick works for who was awarded the Emmy for their broadcast technology. More on that later. For tonight, the winged being is ours. Tomorrow we will take her to the office holiday event and hopefully Andy Jantzen (to whom it really belongs) will take her home with him for the night.

Photos to follow, I promise.

Yet another beautiful sunrise has graced the skies above my house. This time the color does not foretell a storm like it did the last time.

We’ve had temperatures in the 40’s for the past few days and yesterday it rained. With that combination of weather conditions the snow is melting like the wicked witch in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy tossed a bucket of water on her { I'm melting ...} What a mess. Snow is lovely when it’s freshly fallen, all pristine and white. After a few days it starts to look grimy around the edges where it meets the road and after a rain it just turns to slush. Then it refreezes and we get snow the consistency of a snow cone.

Not much else going on around here. Rick has been pretty much off throughout the holidays, either with a snow day, a paid holiday or taking some vacation days. The days have been lazy and we’ve only gotten in the car to go somewhere a few times. We’ve watched movies: a marathon of the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy, a few old favorites that we finally bought ourselves on DVD like Jean de Florette/Manon of the Spring {French subtitled in English}, and Rich Man, Poor Man the first mini-series ever to air on national TV. (We’re still in the process of watching all 27 hours!) We’ve played video games, played with our iPads, read books and pretty much did whatever we felt like. The dogs did get a few walks in too.

I have no resolutions for the coming year. At least not yet. The year is too new yet and who wants to spoil it with a bunch of regulations and restrictions?

I do know that I want to continue on with pottery classes. Just not the classes I was going to before. When winter is over I will pursue a few places “over the mountain” in Warwick and Sugarloaf. I don’t really relish the idea of driving over there in winter weather. So, I"ll wait. I haven’t shared photos of the last object d’art I made because it needs a bit of touch up work. I’m not really happy with how it came out in the end but I learned a few lessons. One is don’t let other people influence what your vision is. I"ll be posting pics soon. It’s not bad, just not what I truly wanted to do. It’s not me. Enough said.

Does it sound lazy not to have goals all laid out for the new year?

The dogs did enjoy the snow before the big melt. Here are a few pics.

Hailey and Bella

Bella

Hailey attempting to catch a snowball.

Bella trying to look serious.

Alex looking regal.

Hailey looking cute.

Poor Bella just kept collecting balls of snow in her fur! The first pic captures her personality perfectly. See the devilish glint in her eyes?

Mom ... these snow balls are getting heavy ...

And a couple of backyard visitors that aren’t dogs! The blue jay with his feathers that look like an intricate mosaic and two tiny Carolina wrens.

I hope your list of resolutions for this new year doesn’t weigh you down too much!