santa, chicken bones, fairies and magic

It was christmas eve night at about 9:30pm. We were on the bridge back home enjoying light traffic and happy children despite the late hour and occasion. After a brief moment of silence the elder monkey blurts out: "I see a white sleigh in the sky!"
"You do? Where honey?"
"Over there by the hills daddy!"
"Just above them right there hon?" I pointed to a plane, low in the sky heading southward, making sure to sound convincing and enthusiastic, "Is it the one with the blinking light right there?"
"YEAH!!! IT"S SANTA DADDY!!!!!!!"
"WOOOOWWWOWOW!!!!! That is soooo coool sweetie!"
"YEAHHHHH! SANTA!" she squeels.
"Wow. Santa must have a flashing safety light on the back of his sleigh just like mommy and daddy's bikes huh? You're eyesight is much better than mine but I can sure see the flashing light real well."
"Yeah, Santa has a flashing light on his sleigh so all the airplanes flying around don't hit crash into him. He's being real safe."
"Wow honey, not everyone sees Santa on his sleigh on christmas eve night!"
"Yeah, but I did!"

I've always wondered how old St. Nick gets around safely in such dense air traffic. Thanks to my knowledgeable and eagle-eyed daughter, I now know.

I was working on printing up a list of beer bottles available at a new bar here in oaktown. It specializes in belgain brews and features a few nice 'Merican ones as well. Have you heard of The Trappist? Like, damn, this place is cool. And, it has incredibly high alcohol belgian ales that encourage one to ride their bike rather than drive. I call that a step in the right direction.

In order to do a little homework before going and getting some exercise, I wanted to study-up on what's available, but my printer was acting all funky and paper was getting jammed. After trying three times with no success I finally pulled open the cover to have a thorough look. Nothing out of the ordinary except some tweaked and torn paper shreds. I cleared these and then slammed the cover shut in the prescribed fashion. Out popped a small object about 1/2 inch long and stick like, but with rounded edges and made out of some very light material. Oh crap I thought. Great, some tiny little tab of plastic snapped off and the printer is forever maimed. But the piece wasn't plastic. Or from the printer. It was one of those small chicken bones that always winds up being chomped on while enjoying chicken stewed in a chile verde. Apparently "someone" was not fond of having the bone in their possesion and it mysteriously ended up stuck under the edge of the printer. It reminded me of that maneuver where as a child you take the gum from your mouth and scrape it from your hand onto whatever edge your little fingers find under the folding chair at a family picnic. Only, I don't think anyone was sitting on top the printer while eating chicken verde. In a folding chair. That I know of that is.

But after my discovery, maybe I should look at it again and scan for gum too.

Once, riding the bike over to the farmers' market, the monkey spotted these and said "Look daddy! Christmas puppies!" I almost wrecked the bike laughing so hard.

I was reminded of this the other day, when we dropped H off at work and on the way home saw one of those electrical transformer boxes in Emeryville that are painted with stencil art. There are dozens of them, black shapes on yellow backgrounds. The one we saw was the typical profile view of a person (like the kind used in most crosswalk signs years ago) only this one had wings.
"Hey check out that art work over there; that person has wings!"
"Yeah I think it must be a fairy daddy!"
"You think?" I asked with a twinge of doubt, feeling myself slipping into playing the contrarian.
"Yes, a girl fairy."
"Really? How can you tell?"
"Because it has wings."
"You mean boy fairies don't have wings?"
"No."
"Not at all?"
"Well, they have one tiny little one, but it just flaps around in the breeze is all."
"Oh." I thought about it for a while then asked: "Sounds like it's better to be a girl fairy."
"Yeah, girl fairies are a lot better."

It really is a blessing to be in the presence of a set of eyes that don't have the same filters in place.

Why such big chairs? Well, it's kinda like around here when things happen or a new skill is demonstrated without any clear explanation of how exactly. It usually ends in "It must be magic daddy!"

Like this morning. Not sitting on such a large chair mind you, but unexpected indeed. I was making a dough when the elder monkey asked "Do you hear that Nutcracker music daddy? In the livingroom?"
"No. Do you?"
""Mmm hmmm," she says with a funny smile and then prances off. A few minutes later I walk in and discover that the Nutcracker is coming through the stereo and is about halfway through the performance.
"How did this come on?" I ask.
"I don't know." Said with a little shrug and smile.
"You mean it was just on when you came in here?"
"Yep!" Then she starts twirling around doing her best to be on her tippie toes.
"You sure you didn't turn it on sweetie?"
"Really I didn't daddy. I just used my magic!"

So according to that logic, from now on, all posting about food that contains a recipe will include an attempt to quantify the amount of "magic" that was used.

Call it a new years resolution of sorts.

Didn't think I was gonna get around to posting again, so sorry to sound repetitious but........

Happy New Year Everybody!