The joy in the season of clear drains
Dec. 26th, 2007 02:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pjthompsonJoy in the season everyone!
I spent Christmas day trying to clear the clogged drain in my shower (uncloggage finally achieved about a half hour ago--hosannah!) and doing a full backup of my harddrive since Norton told me major problems were lodging therein (backup continues as I type). My system had been sluggish for awhile but I ignored it hoping it would go away. Alas, it didn't. I'm very good about backing up files, but I haven't backed up the entire system in...well, forever. When the backup is finished I'll run Norton again and see if I can fix things. So if you don't hear from me for awhile, it probably means something desperate has happened.
Also yesterday we cooked an absolutely delicious pork loin with dried apricots, prunes, rosemary, basted with Madeira. OMG, so good. Sweet potatoes with pecans and marshmallows, some multi-fruit jello thing, the traditional green bean casserole, and pêche beer. None of it on program, but man was it good.
I also managed to get my Christmas cards done. Yeah, I know...
And while I was seeding two pomegranates yesterday I even managed to work in a mythological moment. I can see why that fruit has been so much a part of myth in so many cultures from earliest times (and many scholars believe, since the apple didn't exist in the Middle East, that it was really a pomegranate that Eve allegedly picked). Pomegranates have all these little seeds that are both juice and food and if you cut them, they bleed all over the place.
(The best was to seed them is to cut a little bit off one end then submerge the fruit in a bowl of water as you peel and seed. The seeds fall to the bottom, the pulp floats and is easily skimmed off, and if the seeds bleed, they bleed in the water so clean up is easy.)
But, anyway, myth. The fruit is hard to get to, but sweet-tart taste is delectable; both food and juice; the bleeding thing; and pomegranates appear in the dead of winter—a perfect metaphor for the death and rebirth of the earth. Peeling it and harvesting it is kind of a mystical act in and of itself because it takes some doing. But if you love that taste, it is worth the struggle.
Kind of like writing. Kind of like life.
I spent Christmas day trying to clear the clogged drain in my shower (uncloggage finally achieved about a half hour ago--hosannah!) and doing a full backup of my harddrive since Norton told me major problems were lodging therein (backup continues as I type). My system had been sluggish for awhile but I ignored it hoping it would go away. Alas, it didn't. I'm very good about backing up files, but I haven't backed up the entire system in...well, forever. When the backup is finished I'll run Norton again and see if I can fix things. So if you don't hear from me for awhile, it probably means something desperate has happened.
Also yesterday we cooked an absolutely delicious pork loin with dried apricots, prunes, rosemary, basted with Madeira. OMG, so good. Sweet potatoes with pecans and marshmallows, some multi-fruit jello thing, the traditional green bean casserole, and pêche beer. None of it on program, but man was it good.
I also managed to get my Christmas cards done. Yeah, I know...
And while I was seeding two pomegranates yesterday I even managed to work in a mythological moment. I can see why that fruit has been so much a part of myth in so many cultures from earliest times (and many scholars believe, since the apple didn't exist in the Middle East, that it was really a pomegranate that Eve allegedly picked). Pomegranates have all these little seeds that are both juice and food and if you cut them, they bleed all over the place.
(The best was to seed them is to cut a little bit off one end then submerge the fruit in a bowl of water as you peel and seed. The seeds fall to the bottom, the pulp floats and is easily skimmed off, and if the seeds bleed, they bleed in the water so clean up is easy.)
But, anyway, myth. The fruit is hard to get to, but sweet-tart taste is delectable; both food and juice; the bleeding thing; and pomegranates appear in the dead of winter—a perfect metaphor for the death and rebirth of the earth. Peeling it and harvesting it is kind of a mystical act in and of itself because it takes some doing. But if you love that taste, it is worth the struggle.
Kind of like writing. Kind of like life.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-27 05:04 am (UTC)I like the thoughts on pomegranates... I've never had any, but someone leaves them at work every now and then for whomever wants to take 'em. Maybe I'll grab one next time, if for no other reason than symbolism.
no subject
Date: 2007-12-27 07:53 pm (UTC)