Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Early Christmas!

Well, last night was pretty much OUR Christmas!  We made ourselves a lovely dinner, and then opened up all Mark's presents that had just arrived from Amazon. 

We had a couple of those super-nice "prime" steaks that Buddy and Lisa ordered for us via their Little Village Restaurant, and Mark made boiled potatoes (we ARE Yankees - forget the rice!), and I made us some complicated salads and used that yummy salad dressing we bought from Mike Anderson's Restaurant where we ate on Sunday.  I had a spinach salad down there Sunday with blackened shrimp on top and their homemade Pepper Jelly Vinaigrette and that dressing was sooooo good I absolutely HAD to buy some.  I was hoping it would say on the jar what exactly was in there, but since it was homemade, they just poured it into one of those big canning jars.  Oh well, I may not know how they made it, but it is still incredibly good!  I LOVE that stuff!

Hey -- is there ANYTHING you can't find on Google???  Did a search for that salad and . . . voila!

Spinach Salad With Pepper Jelly Vinaigrette


VINAIGRETTE INGREDIENTS

1/4 cup pepper jelly

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 cup olive oil


SALAD INGREDIENTS

6 ounces fresh baby spinach leaves

2 tablespoons sun-dried tomatoes

2 tablespoons roasted pecans

2 tablespoons golden raisins

1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds

1/4 cup blue cheese, crumbles

5 kalamata olives


Directions:

1 Vinaigrette Directions: Combine all ingredients and mix well in blender.

2 Salad Directions: Combine spinach, 1/3 cup ONLY of vinaigrette, tomatoes, pecans and raisins in large mixing bowl.

3 Toss until leaves are evenly coated with vinaigrette.

4 Garnish with blue cheese and whatever -- olives, shrimp, chicken cubes, etc.


As for Mark's presents, he wanted a tablet so he could stop hauling actual books out to the rig, and he wanted a single cup coffee pot -- also for use out on the rig.  So I got him both.  He got the big  8.9" Kindle Fire HD.   I love that you can move stuff from the Kindle to your computer or your phone or even the TV!  Nice.


And unlike my old original Kindle, you can do ANYTHING on this new one.  Check this out:




I'll tell you what - that thing is really cool!  And since I've had a Kindle ever since they came out several years ago, and since I've been an Amazon Prime member for years as well, Mark now has access to all my previous books that are stored up in the Amazon "Cloud" storage facility (NOT that he's all that into the horse books and things that most of mine are about  ;-D  ).  But the Amazon Prime membership allows him to access all kinds of TV shows and movies on that thing for free.  And he can get virtually any magazine he might like -- they have hundreds of them!  

One of the best things about Kindles is that ALL magazines are free for the first month and the first two chapters of all books can be downloaded for free as well so you don't have to go ahead and buy anything you decide you don't really like!   Amazon also has a sort of "library" for Prime members, too.  You can download one book at a time for free.

You can also download any older magazines for free, as well.  So those history magazines and things like car magazines, etc. that aren't current-date-related are all available for nothing!  That, added to a couple of current book purchases each month, should keep Mark suitably entertained out there on the rig for the duration! 

Got a note from Vickie.  She's going to drive down from DC and arrive on Saturday since Mark will be going back to work on the 18th and won't be here for actual Christmas.  Then she's flying out to Dallas for some sort of meeting and leaving her car at the BR airport.  John will be flying down later and picking up the car.  Then he'll go pick Vickie back up when she flies back from Dallas nearer Christmas.  Good plan!

I'm sure they will be spending Christmas with their families and I will choose to hang out with our horses and dogs instead.  (What can I say -- I guess I'm just not all that "social" anymore -- particularly at Christmas.  Christmas is just not my "thing.")  But it'll be great to have them staying at our house -- I'll get to visit with them between their visits elsewhere anyway.

No comments: