Working New Year's

Sigh. Yes, I spent almost the entire day at the Acme. I had to work 8 hours, and I work early tomorrow. I'm not happy about it, but I know, I know, it's a paycheck and health insurance.

Work was busy all day long. If people weren't picking up platters for New Year's parties, they were buying pork for their traditional New Year's dinners. It's also the beginning of the month, which means we had a lot of annoying people coming out of the woodwork. Thankfully, there were no major problems, and I was able to shut down without a relief.

Good thing, too. I wanted to get my shopping for my own New Year's breakfast and dinner done and get my schedule. I'm not happy with my schedule at all. After having me work 30 hours this week, all I get next week is 18. Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday off again. While it'll be nice to be able to use those days to get the Christmas decorations down without a fuss, I do wish I had a steady schedule. 30 hours one week and 18 the next drives me crazy and tires me out.

I didn't have quite as big of a shopping trip as I have the past few weeks. The only meat I needed was ham for tomorrow's breakfast; all I needed for produce was bananas and grapefruit. Yoplait Light Yogurt was on sale, so I stocked up on that. Grabbed part-skim ricotta and mozzarella cheese for dinner. I was out of cereal, so I picked up Acme's generic Life on sale. Got one of Bigelow's holiday limited edition teas ("Eggnog'in") and treated myself to three bags of Land O'Lakes Gourmet Hot Chocolate.

After I got home, I put everything away and started dinner. I was going to make Baked Pasta with ground chicken and cheese, but I didn't have the time. I just made Skillet Tomato Pasta with ground chicken, ricotta, and mozzarella cheese, along with Spinach Salad with Grapefruit Sections.

Made Whipped Syllabub from Felicity's Cooking Studio for dessert. While most people toast the New Year with champagne, I go far more decadent...and non-alcoholic. The Whipped Syllabub is stiff-beat heavy whipped cream with a mixture of fresh-squeezed orange juice, lemon juice, sugar, and sparkling apple cider. It was very creamy and tasty.

Watched the Bowery Boys and cartoons as my last movies of 2010. Looking For Danger is the best of the Stanley Clements-era Bowery Boys I've seen so far. Duke relates how he, Sach, and the others outwitted the Nazis and helped the Allies in North Africa during World War II. Far more action-oriented than most of the other Clements-era movies, this one was a lot of fun, especially Sach and Duke loose in the Sultan's harem!

After the Boys ended, I ran Rudolph's Shiny New Year. This is the first of several Rankin-Bass follow-ups to their most famous property. Rudolph has to find the Baby New Year before the year begins...but he has very big ears that people keep laughing at, which upsets him so that he runs off. Yes, this is campy, but it does have some nice music, including the touching "The Moving Finger Writes."

Ran a couple of Woody Woodpecker cartoons to finish out my year as I did the dishes. Woody was not the most attractive character in his early years, either physically (he was buck-toothed and had the fattest legs I ever saw on a bird) or mentally (even HE questions how crazy he is). On the other hand, there was some funny moments, including Woody and a cat trying to eat each other during a particuarly severe winter in "Pantry Panic."

And...here's hoping that all of you have a happy, healthy, and laughter-filled 2011! Happy New Year to one and all!