Skip to main content

Apple spice cake, a long nap and crabs. Oh my!

Mele Kalikimaka is the thing to say,
On a bright Hawaiian Christmas Day,
That's the island greeting that we send to you
From the land where palm trees sway,
Here we know that Christmas will be green and bright,
The sun to shine by day and all the stars at night,
Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii's way
To say "Merry Christmas to you."
Written by R. Alex Anderson, 1949


http://melekalikimaka.com/meleka.wav

If you click on the link above, you can hear this classic, as sung by Bing Crosby. What better to put you in the holiday spirit!

Ah, Christmas time. It must be the reason I got the bug to bake tonight. So after watching Shrek 3, I whipped up an apple spice cake. It's still cooling. It's late, so I won't know how it tastes until tomorrow morning. I think it will go nicely with my coffee. It definitely smells good.

I was so exhausted after working four days in a row at the winery this week that today, when Ron said he was going to take a nap, I joined him, only to wake up three hours later! Three hours! It felt great! It's also why I'm sitting here blogging my heart out at 10 p.m., not the least bit sleepy. Friday night my feet were so sore that I was actually beginning to limp a little. Even my Crocs were no help. My left arch felt swollen, my legs ached, my back twinged as though I'd been shoveling heavy, wet snow for hours. It was enough to make me think that, instead of a job that requires me to be on my feet all day for peanuts, I should find one that lets me sit all day and pays me some real money. If I need exercise, I'll go to the gym or take a long walk. Fun as it is, There's no way I could work at the winery full time. I don't know how my manager Kathie does it. She arrives at 8 a.m. to clean and prep the place for opening. Then she works alongside us for 8 hours. She puts in 10 hour days, mostly on her feet, four days a week.

I had vowed to seek out some sun today, but with the long nap and all, it seemed a better day to clean house. Now, I really feel ready for the holiday. Tomorrow, I plan to deliver locally made preserves to my neighbors' porches to wish them Merry Christmas. Then it's off to the beach!

My mom sends us dungeness crabs every year for Christmas. Sounds weird, huh? It's something that was scarce in Colorado. Turns out it's hard to find here, too. It's also one of my favorite foods. So it's become a tradition. We ate crab for dinner last night, then again tonight. I'm thinking that tomorrow night, we might eat crab.

I'm watching John Mayer wail right now on Austin City Limits. That boy just oozes talent from every pore.

A hui hou. Mele Kalikimaka. Aloha!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Fruity booty

It was a long drive from Glenwood to the northern tip of the island -- three hours -- so for sustenance, we stopped at Baker Tom's for malasadas on the way. My pal Kathy and I were headed to Kapa'au for a hike, one we'd read about in the local newspaper. The couple who run Baker Tom's (not sure if the husband is actually Tom or not) are delightful, with enduring stamina. They're as old as radio, yet they're always on duty, ready to serve behind the counter, as they have for many years, frying, baking, brewing and smiling, there in Papaikou , gateway to the Hamakua Coast. The malasadas are enormous, cheap and delicious, the coffee OK, the tourists all happy to have discovered this place, buzzing with sugar and caffeine. They make a killer pumpkin cheesecake at Baker Tom's, too. It's always a pleasant stop. Ahapua'a . It's a Hawaiian land division, usually a strip or wedge, stretching from mountain to sea. Hawaiians lived in villages wit

Born and bred

The creature stared at me, wide-eyed through the florescent glare, Saran Wrap stretched tight across its broad back. Alone in the seafood cooler, he was the only one of his kind, there among the farmed, color-added Atlantic salmon and mud-flavored tilapia, perched on a blue foam tray, legs tucked 'round him like a comfy kitten. He didn't blink. He was dead, red, cooked and chilled, ready to eat. Such a find is rare in the City Market fish department in Gunnison, Colorado. What if nobody takes him home? I thought. This beautiful animal will have died needlessly, ripped from his home, family and friends (Dory, Nemo, Crush and Gill?) only to be tossed in the trash when his expiration date came and went. I lifted him for closer inspection, checked that date, felt the heft of him, scanned his surface for cracks and blemishes. The creature was perfect. I lowered him back into the cooler, nodded farewell, turned to walk away, took one step, and stopped. Shoppers strolled past, stud

Small town observations

Every day at noon, a siren blares from atop the city government building in Gunnison. Each time I hear it, I want to shout, “Yabba dabba doo!” even though it’s nowhere near happy hour. I’ve blurted this once or twice, only to elicit blank stares in response. Am I that old? Doesn’t anyone remember the The Flintstones? I hear that horn and imagine Fred sliding down the long neck of his gravel-quarry dino-dozer (which, thanks to Jurassic Park and the miracle of Google we all recognize now as riojasaurus). Quitting time! Fred flees, his fleet feet slapping toward a rack o’ ribs and a night of good times with Wilma, Barney, Betty and Dino. That’s Dino the dino, pronounced Deeno the dyno. Think that’s delusional? Another day, walking downtown near the source of the noontime wale, it struck me, a revelation it was, that the ramp up to full blast sounds just like the introduction to Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, only this is a mega-air-raid, civil-defense siren solo rather than a clarinet, whic