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Always Packed for Adventure!

It's the destination and the journey.

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Social Distancing in Littleton: Week 32

The big news this week has been the Colorado wildfires. Even though the election is less than a week away, the wildfires have been at the top of the news and it is devastating. We are not close enough to be evacuated or to really worry, but the clouds of smoke that we could see from our neighborhood were apocalyptic.

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Luckily, a heavy snow storm came a few days later, which really helped the fire fighting efforts.

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It was a cozy Sunday, as we stayed inside and watched the falling snow. I baked my first layer cake with homemade icing. It was Nigella Lawson’s Coffee Layer Cake and I was thrilled when Nigella commented on my Instagram picture!

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Dan made a Dutch Baby pancake. He loves the Dutch Babies from The Original Pancake House, so it was great that he figured out how to recreate it at home. His were even better than the restaurant. It looks like our weekend tradition of breakfast at the pancake house will end. We now need to figure out how to make their tropical syrup that I love!

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We watched the latest Borat film :”Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.” I’m exhausted from typing that title! Sacha Baron Cohen certainly knows how to push buttons and this will not be everyone’s taste, but as with the first film, the reactions of the unsuspecting American public are the most shocking. Thankfully there are a few really good people in the film, but that doesn’t make up for the genuine racist/sexist/lack of humanity responses that some people gave. The film is timely with stunts involving Mike Pence and Rudy Giuliani. It was of course, released to tie-in with the election. I enjoyed it and I was impressed that Baron Cohen put himself in risky situations to pull this off. Maria Bakalova who plays his daughter, absolutely steals every scene. It wasn’t nearly as entertaining as the first Borat, but I don’t feel that it was supposed to be. These are seriously times and the film reflects the tone of the United States. It’s the type of film that I’ve continued to think about five days later, so to that end, it was very effective.

We also finally broke down and paid to see “Bill and Ted Face the Music.” OMG…this might just be the worst film that I’ve ever seen. Not only was it bad, it was boring. BORING!!! I love Keanu Reeves, but it hurt to watch this. I had high hopes from a nostalgia perspective, but it missed the mark in every way.

We played Top Golf with our friends on Saturday night. I played worse than my first time, but I still had fun. I’d love to go again. I did notice that the employees at Top Golf seemed to be less rigid about the covid protocols. For example, there were more than six people in some of the bays, and there were a few big parties happening. This made me nervous. The covid cases are really on the rise, and I think we will need to revert to being even more cautious. I’m anticipating locking down like last spring.

The field near our house was full of cows and we saw a gorgeous hawk.

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To end, a few cute pictures of Tom. He enjoyed the snow too, and wondered why he couldn’t catch the snowflakes. The window glass is full of paw prints from his furious attempts to catch snowflakes.

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tags: Social Distancing in Littleton, Social Distancing in Colorado, Covid 19 in Colorado, Colorado Wildfires, Pictures Colorado Wildfires, Smoke from Colorado Wildfires, Snow in Littleton, Colorado Snow Storm 2020, Nigella Lawson Recipe, Nigella Lawson Coffee Layer Cake, Home Baking, Newbie Baker, Dutch Baby Pancake, Recipe for Dutch Baby Pancake, Picture of Dutch Baby Pancake, What is a Dutch Baby Pancake, Borat Sequel, Sacha Baron Cohen, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, Borat and Mike Pence, Borat and Rudy Giuliani, Borat and Maria Bakalova, Borat's Daughter, Bill and Ted Face the Music Review, Worst Movie of 2020, Keanu Reeves Bill and Ted Face the Music, Unnecessary Sequels, Cow Pictures, Top Golf Colorado, Covid Safety Top Golf, Cute Cat Pictures, One Week Before Election 2020, Cats and Snow
categories: Eat, Life, Visit, Watch
Thursday 10.29.20
Posted by Karen Lea Germain
 

Social Distancing in Littleton: Week 21

On the Covid-19 front, there have not been any significant changes in Colorado. I’m grateful that the mask mandate is still in effect, and I hope that it will be extended beyond the initial thirty days. Whether or not they agree with the mandate, most people seem to be complying, and there is less aggression when we are in stores. People generally seem calm, which is a relief. Truly, life feels more or less normal.

One thing that has really bothered me is the spike in mask conspiracy theories. A new one that I read about involves a hashtag= “save our children,” and links the wearing of masks to a child sex trafficking and pedophilia. Really? It goes deeper, to a conspiracy that powerful people ( democratic politicians/Bill Gates/Celebrities like Tom Hanks) are in on it, somehow harvesting the power from children that is emitted when they are extremely fearful, including acts of cannibalism with children. How can anyone believe this crap???

It makes me even more angry that these conspiracies serve to undermine the vital importance of wearing masks and public safety. They also distract from more important issues like the BLM movement and the upcoming election. It’s maddening. Dan is tired of hearing me complain about it, and quite honestly, I’ve spent too much energy getting worked up over it, so I’m going to distancing myself from reading about the conspiracies. I’m optimistic that more people are level-headed and see through this nonsense.

This week was low-key and fairly normal. We ran errands and ate out a few times, including a “new-to-us” Vietnamese restaurant, where I tried Vietnamese-style iced coffee. It tastes similar to Thai iced coffee, but a little less sweet.

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I don’t have a picture of it, but I made the most amazing fresh blueberry crumble. It was delicious, and I even made it with half the recommended sugar. It will happen again and soon.

Dan went golfing with a few of the guys in our neighborhood. I have to share pictures that he took of our local golf course. This is just a short distance from our house and it is gorgeous! It reminds me of Red Rock Canyon in Las Vegas.

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In most exciting news, Wednesday was my birthday. I worked, as usual, but Dan spoiled me rotten.

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The big package was a Cornhole set, which I’ve been wanting for a few years. I’m surprisingly good at it! I also received several cool kitchen gadgets- many from my Amazon Wishlist, fuzzy socks, a cook book, another outdoor game where you throw a ball on a trampoline ( looks fun), a cleaning gadget ( I’m old, I like cleaning gadgets), a ceramic cotton ball holder shaped like a rabbit, and a box of rock candy, which I recently mentioned was a must-have purchase during childhood Disneyland trips. So many friends and family sent messages and I was much loved on my birthday.

Tom delighted in the box that one of my presents came in. It can be your birthday too Tom!

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There is an extra-special treat for this coming weekend, which I will reveal next week. I’ve probably never been this spoiled on my birthday! :-)

Which brings me to some funny emotions that I’ve been having this week. My birthday is always a time when I miss my mom a bit more intensely than other times of the year, and last night, we were watching the fabulous new Anna Kendrick series “Love Life”- specifically an episode regarding Kendrick’s character Darby and her relationship with her mom. Even though my relationship with my mom was nothing like Darby’s, there were themes about simply needing your mom. It made me really, really sad and I couldn’t stop crying. I’m grateful to have a husband who loves me enough to make my birthday incredibly special, but I still miss and need my mom. It’s tough.

On the great news front, last night we had the announcement that Biden has picked Kamala Harris to run as his VP. I’m thrilled and optimistic.

I’m ending on a happy note with cute pictures of the cats. This week, Tom started a new behavior of stealing stuffed animals off of my bookshelf. Naturally, those animals have been moved to a safe, “Tom Free” zone, but it was very funny to catch him being a thief.

Slinky is living his best life by licking the leftovers from a bowl of whipped cream. He licked it completely clean.

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tags: Social Distancing in Littleton, Social Distancing in Colorado, Covid 19 in Colorado, Covid 19 in Littleton, Masks in Colorado, Mask Mandate in Colorado, Hashtag Save Our Children, Save Our Children Conspiracy, Covid-19 Conspiracy Theroeis, Sex Trafficking Conspiracy Theories, Friends who are Conspiracy Theorists, Bill Gates Save our Children, Vietnamese Iced Coffee, Golfing in Roxborough Colorado, Golfing in Colorado, Red Rocks in Colorado, Beautiful Colorado, Anna Kendrick Love Life, Spoiled on my Birthday, My Husband spoils Me, Birthday Surprises from my Husband, I Miss my Mom, Grieving for my Mom, Darby on Love Life, Hope Davis and Anna Kendrick Love Life, Cute Cat Pictures, Cat who Steals Things, Cats Stealing Stuffed Animals, Cornhole Set, Best Kitchen Gadgets, Kamala Harris VP Pick
categories: Eat, Life, Watch
Thursday 08.13.20
Posted by Karen Lea Germain
 

Social Distancing in Littleton: Week Nineteen

This week has been a bit tough. It’s usually the best week of our summer holidays, as we celebrate both my husband and my step-daughter’s birthdays. We are normally traveling somewhere fun and doing extra special things to mark the birthdays. Last year, we were in Hawaii, and this year, we were supposed to be in Orlando. Also, my stepdaughter is turning thirteen, so it’s a big birthday.

I feel grateful that we are all healthy and that the adults are employed. We are much luckier than many. This acknowledged, it is difficult that we had to cancel our vacation, especially since we have not seen the kids since last summer. We feel that our London trip in the fall has about a 50/50 chance of happening, so that’s also tough. We miss the kids.

In honor of past vacations, I want to share one of my favorite family vacation photos from our Walt Disney World trip in 2016.

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We have been celebrating Dan’s birthday, which was on Tuesday. Last Saturday, I took him to dinner at The Melting Pot. We felt very safe there, as the restaurant is huge, and they very much spaced out the guests. We had a alcove to ourselves, which was not only private, but very romantic!

Here is a picture that we took as we were heading to dinner.

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And a few at dinner. We did have masks on at all times, except while eating.

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I planned The Melting Pot for Saturday night, because I thought that it would be too much to enjoy on a work night, but on Dan’s actual birthday, it seemed sad not to go out, so we went to Carboy Winery. Carboy Winery is very strict with their mask/social distancing poiicy, plus they have awesome wine-slushies, so we like to support them. They are one of my favorite local discoveries.

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The birthday fun continued as we received a surprise dual-birthday ( mine is in early August) surprise from my mom’s best friend, Nancy. I had told her about holding the chicken at the farm last week and how I wished our local community allowed pet chickens, so she sent us a pair. In her card, she told us their names are Bertha and Ernesta. Yes, one is missing a beak.

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I love them so much. They’ve been given a place of honor on the curio cabinet, right behind our Ukulele from Hawaii!

Besides feeling down about the vacations, I’ve been feeling confused and frustrated. I have a close friend, someone whom I care very much about, who is deep into conspiracy theories regarding covid. She shares news stories that often get labeled as false or misleading by Facebook. Breitbart stuff. I disagree with her, but I also care about her.

I’m conflicted. I feel like I should say something, because I think what she posts are harmful ,and it makes me even more worried to see others agreeing with her. However, I’m not sure how to approach her, as I know she is sincere in her beliefs and they are her truth. I see conspiracy theory and she sees rock-solid evidence. What to do? If I lived closer and could see her, I’d have a conversation. A phone call would have the same tone, where you can really feel the vibe of the situation. I’ve felt compelled to respond to her Facebook threads, but I think it would come off as antagonistic or unkind. I feel angry about it though. My tolerance for anti-mask, “covid isn’t a big deal” talk is gone, but I’m left not knowing what to do with people I love who persist with this.

In writing news, I didn’t advance to the final round of the NYC Midnight Microfiction contest. I was disappointed, but I understood. My round-two piece wasn’t great.

Instead of writing, I began my new ELS Tutoring Youtube Channel: A to Z with Zora G. It’s still very rough, but I’m going to keep working on it. Dan has been a huge help!

In health news, I found out that my health scare from a few weeks ago, was nothing to worry about. This is a huge relief! HUGE!!!

We finished watching The imagineering Story documentary on Disney Plus. It’s great and helped fill the void of missing the theme parks. We also watched the latest Charlize Theron Film, The Old Guard. The Old Guard is fantasy movie about immortals. I wasn’t sure about it for the first fifteen minutes, the premise seemed silly, but then it had me hooked. Plus, I really like Theron.

We had a few amazing sunsets.

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Dan took this picture of me in our nearby field.

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And finally, cute cat pictures from this week. Slinky was trying to sit on my lap while I was trying to write.

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tags: Social Distancing in Littleton, Corona Virus in Littleton, Covid 19 in Colorado, Covid 19 Conspiracy Theory, How to Handle Conspiracy Theorist, Friends who Promote Conspiracy Theories, The Melting Pot Littleton, Dining Out During Covid, Dining In During Covid, Walt Disney World Vacation, Covid-19 Precautions, Summer Birthdays, Canceling 2020 Summer Vacations, Summer 2020, Family Traditions, Timothy Oulton Rex Mirror, Safety Precautions at The Melting Pot, Carboy Winery Littleton, Drinks of Summer, Wine Slushy, Best Restaurants in Littleton, Best Surprise Presents, Pet Chickens, NYC Microfiction Contest, A to Z with Zora G, A to Z with Zora G Youtube, ESL YouTube Channel, A to Z with Zora G Youtube ESL, ESL Tutor Channels Youtube, The Imagineering Story Disney, The Old Guard Charlize Theron, Colorado Sunsets, Sterling Ranch Colorado, Cute Cat Pictures, Ginger Cats, Chocolate Fondue, Friends with Different Opinions, Traveling to Europe Fall 2020, Character Pictures Walt Disney World, Breitbart Covid Stories
categories: Eat, Life, Watch
Thursday 07.30.20
Posted by Karen Lea Germain
 
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