We Need a Little Christmas

I started a gorgeous, sunny, 40-degree morning reading The Autobiography of Santa Claus snuggled in bed. Linda gave me this and the other two books in the Santa Chronicles series for Christmas a few years ago. Autobiography is just that; Santa tells his story, from his early years as a child trying to do good for his neighbors in ancient Turkey to modern times. It's a colorful tale that involves many famous Christmas legends, and quite a well-known figures in world and US history. I actually prefer the next book, How Mrs. Claus Saved Christmas. Layla Claus, also a native of ancient Turkey, is a far more compelling character than her laid-back husband. The story, about how Layla (and Arthur of Britain - yes, "King" Arthur) became involved in the Canterbury Christmas March and the English subjects' attempts to restore Christmas in the 1600s when the Puritans banned it, is also more exciting than Santa's world history tidbits.

I think I'll continue to do my laundry on Tuesdays. Once again, when I arrived there around quarter of 12, it was dead. Only two other people were there when I was. Not even the manager could be seen. Good thing, because I had a fair-sized load, including several heavy pairs of pants.

When I got home, I put away the laundry, had a quick lunch of leftovers, and went right into cookie baking. Since doing the laundry was my only plans for today, I saved this afternoon for the two recipes that take the longest to make, the Biscotti and the Merry Christmas Molasses Cut-Outs. The Biscotti is an authentic Italian recipe from my Italian Farmhouse Cookbook. The Merry Christmas Molasses cookies are a variation on a recipe in the Betty Crocker Cooky Book. The Biscotti are basically a heavy rolled butter cookie. (For extra flavor, I used almond extract, rather than vanilla, this year.) Instead of cutting them in rusk shapes, I roll them into wreaths and candy canes and sprinkle on colored sugar. The Molasses cut-outs are crispier versions of gingerbread men. I like them much better than the same old sugar cookies everyone makes. I'm not the only one. These are probably my most-requested Christmas cookie. They get cut out with cookie cutters and also sprinkled with colored sugar and cinnamon Imperials.

Ran a Bowery Boys movie and the 1974 film version of Mame while doing my baking. The Bowery Boys movie was one of the rare ones from the mid-50s centered mostly around Louie's Sweet Shop. In Spy Chasers, the Boys find themselves protecting the King and Princess of Truvania while Louie awaits a courier coming with half of a coin. If the coin fits, the King is to leave the country and help with a revolution that would put him back on the throne. Two of the King's trusted advisers are traitors who create a phony coin. The woman hypnotizes Sach to try to get him to help them, but as usual, he turns out to be less than useful. One of the better entries with the four Boys and Louie. Slip trying to "drill" the others is especially amusing.

Lucile Ball is Mame, the lovable, eccentric aunt with the heart of gold and hair color that changes at whim. Her young nephew Patrick and his nanny Agnes (Jane Connell) comes to live with Mame during the Roaring Twenties, when her home at Beekman Place in New York was a fashionable address for all of the Big Apple's Bohemians and free-thinkers. Mame introduces Patrick to her fun-loving life and her wacky friends, including the perpetually soused stage star Vera Charles (Beatrice Arthur). Mame and Patrick will always be each other's true loves, come heck, high water, the Depression, and a handsome southern millionaire (Robert Preston), but when a now-grown Patrick expresses his wish to marry into a bigoted, snooty Conneticut family that is everything his aunt isn't, how will Mame handle that her "little love" has changed?

Critics have been nasty about this one for years, complaining about the soft-focus photography and a seemingly miscast Lucile Ball. I think Ball's quite suited to the role, raspy voice and all, and the movie is absolutely adorable. Ball does get a lot of chances for fun, including her roller-skating across a department store and the famous Fox Hunt Ballet sequence. Robert Preston is a sweet Beauregard Burnside, too. You can understand why Ball would go for him so quickly, especially when he sings the dreamy ballad "Loving You" that Jerry Herman wrote directly for the film. My other favorite numbers are the standard "We Need a Little Christmas" (with Agnes doubling as a Christmas tree in lots of tinsel garland), the "Open a New Window" montage, and Arthur and Ball's hilarious "Bosom Buddies." (It's worth getting the DVD for "Bosom Buddies" alone.) If you're a fan of Jerry Herman, Ball, Preston, Arthur, or the overstuffed musicals of the 60s and early 70s, this is definitely worth looking into.

I spent all afternoon in front of my stove and really needed to get out for a while. After the dishes were done and the last batches of cookies were cooling on a towel on the table, I headed out for a run to WaWa and a stroll around the neighborhood to look at Christmas lights. I love the light displays in my neighborhood. It's so festive. There are houses with nothing but candles in the windows. (One house had really pretty green candles that went well with their window holly wreaths.) There were houses that just had a swag of icicle hanging lights on the roof. And then, there were the houses that went all out, with lights strung from every tree, signs saying "Merry Christmas" or "Seasons Greetings", lighted figurines (one lighted dear actually moved his head up and down), lit wreathes, and every kind of inflatable imaginable. (My favorites was the adorable teddy bear in the Santa hat who held a red and green box that says "Happy Holidays" and the Santa in the shades on the motorcycle.)

When I came home, I had my turkey and spinach Shorti hoagie and watched a vaguely Christmas-related Get Smart episode from the first season, "Our Man In Toyland." Max and 99 have to figure out how a CHAOS agent is smuggling secret information out of the country. They discover the means in the toy section of a department store, but will they survive to tell the Chief?