Day 19.288: Exile #2's Sunday Column #566

Exile #2 writes...

With just over a week until the midterms, our media and our mailboxes have been inundated with ads for the upcoming elections. We have received summaries of our voting record along with the encouragement to vote again. We have had flyers and visitors to the doorstep. The younger exiles have received particular attention, and even some handwritten notes, but today, friends from our nature group handed round perhaps my favorite piece of election merch so far. Penzeys Spices, doing its part for the Democratic Party, have been distributing spice mixes with the exhortation to “season liberally”. Each packet comes with a little lesson in civics and the potential to create something delicious. Who wouldn’t vote for that?

Day 19.275: Final gathering

A couple more substitutes for our final gathering - dinner in the pub.

We have a few more hours here before our return journey. It's been a lovely trip with a total of 18 family members caught up with (all too briefly) in a very short time.

Day 19.182: Five for lunch

Exile #4 came for a visit last night and we took the opportunity of us all being together to go out for lunch. 

The rest of the day has been dominated by the World Cup and we are still waiting to see who England will meet in the last four.

Day 19.174: Quick visit to Exile #4

I was off work yesterday and today in honor of tomorrow’s holiday. Exile #2 and I decided to pay a quick visit to Exile #4 to see how they are getting on in their new place. All went well and we were able to take them out for lunch.

It was all delightfully uneventful compared with the previous time we traveled from here to there. 

Day 19.050: Exile #2’s Sunday Column #545

Exile #2 writes...

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus, or, Happy St. David’s Day! We celebrated appropriately enough with Welsh cakes and a big, thankful sigh that there was no rugby this weekend.

In honor of the day, I bought some daffodils and noticed that they came with a very clear warning that they were not edible. Apparently there have been occasions when people have used them in place of onions, so labeling is now general practice, as they are actually fairly toxic. Funnily enough, the Welsh word for “leeks” is “cennin”, whilst daffodils are “cennin Pedr” or in other words, “Peter’s leeks”, so I guess the resemblance has been noted for some time. It struck me that cennin Pedr could actually be a bit of dark humor, referring to St. Peter, due to their toxicity, but Pedr’s identity seems to be lost in the mists of time, and as far as I know, he was just a Welshman with a field.

Day 19.038: Pancakes

After our Mardi Gras themed potluck at church on Sunday, it was back to Shrove Tuesday today with some pancake flipping to mark the occasion:

Day 19.025: Night out

This evening we took Exile #3 and her friend to a cinema in Methuen MA to see the Stray Kids movie (that was the nearest place showing it). While they did that Exile #2 and I went out for dinner in nearby North Andover. 

When we got back to the cinema, the movie finished and the K-pop fans came streaming out - many dressed up for the occasion. It seems we all had a fun night.

Day 19.001: Exile #2’s Sunday Column #538

Exile #2 writes...

We didn’t blindfold Exile #1 yesterday but we didn’t tell him where he was going for his birthday activity. We were almost at the venue before he guessed, which was fun for us, at least! We followed up with lunch nearby, then headed home for some quiet activities (Exile #1 and Exile #4 have been working on a project, I have books on the go). We then finished it all off with take out and a trivia quiz around the table. As Exile #4 is heading back to college tomorrow, it was a great way to round off the holiday and celebrate Exile #1.

Day 18.352: Self portrait

We’ve had a nice day - including brunch and carols at church preceded by helping a stranger by pushing her car out of the middle of an intersection nearby. Some puzzles, video editing and family TV watching rounded out the day along with some more eating of course. 

And just for fun, here’s a sort-of-selfie I took a week ago. 

Day 18.349: Christmas Day

Our day included coordinating PJs:

and setting fire to the Christmas pudding:

And also games and food and gifts and laughter and calls to family and music - not bad really!

Day 18.312: How much cheese is too much?

Yesterday, as I was getting home from work there was a report on the radio from the world cheese championships in Switzerland. The report described a hall the size of a football field full of cheeses to be judged. 

In a different lots-of-cheese event today, Exile #2 noticed this block of pecorino. The wedge shapes in the foreground are sensible portions. The large block is ten pounds of cheese. 

I believe it’s still available for now. 

Day 18.310: Your Yorkshire is showing

We had a call from Exile #4 while we were eating dinner. One of the bits of news they had was that they were in the process of making a small test batch of Yorkshire puddings. Since I spent some formative years (from 1 to 11) in Yorkshire, I’ll claim this as a bit of my heritage. 

By the time we finished our conversation, they were done and Exile #4 sent a.picture. They look pretty good. 

Day 18.213: Five go celebrating

All of us went out for a meal this evening to celebrate a graduation and three birthdays before Exile #4 heads back to college tomorrow. We ended the day with ice cream followed by two attempts to capture the moment:

Day 18.161: #3:23

Exile #3’s choice of celebration included take-out burgers from local institution Rapid Rays, carrot cake and a captive audience for some K-Pop education in the form of a presentation she’d prepared entitled  “A Beginner’s Guide to ITZY”. 

Day 18.114: Exile #2's Sunday Column #523

Exile #2 writes...

After a morning working hard in the church gardens yesterday, we came home to help E5N1 get ready for prom. We dropped him off with friends for a very fancy limo ride, then followed behind to take photos of them at the park before they headed off for dinner and then prom.

It turns out E5N1 and a friend had put themselves up (somewhat mischievously) for prom king and queen and, in fact, they came in a close second, pipped to the post only by the star footballer and his prom date!

Meanwhile, Exile #1 took the opportunity to go and have some Japanese food at a new restaurant then came home to watch a movie which finished just as E5N1 got in touch to ask for a ride home! Perfect!

Day 18.066: Paddy's

Dinner had an Irish theme today. My beer was neither green nor alcoholic one or other of which might be frowned upon by some. 

Day 18.053: Pause for pancakes

I have more to tell you about our visit to New Hampshire, but for today - I must inform you that we marked today by flipping pancakes.

Day 18.050: St. David’s Day

The day was marked with a flag and some Welsh cakes. 

E5N1 spent the morning at school helping the other schools who will be visiting to compete in the regional one-act festival rehearse their tech. 

Exile #2 and I had an outing, but reports on that can wait for another day. 

Day 18.006: Fishing, fish, fashion

At the risk of making it look like this week had been all fun and games, this afternoon’s activity was deep sea fishing. We had a good catch, ate some of them straight off the boat, and then got dressed for the final dinner. 

Day 17.350: Christmas Day

We started with matching Christmas pajamas and ended with setting fire to Christmas pudding so we may have reached the peak of our a dual-culture Christmas celebrations after all these years here.