Kicked off a glorious, sunny morning with gingerbread pancakes for breakfast, then some holiday baking. Since the cranberry bread recipe I've used for the past few years tends to not want to cook in the middle, I thought I'd try a slightly different one on the back of the Ocean Spray fresh cranberries bag. It was pretty much the same as the other one, only using oil instead of butter. That seems to have done the trick. It cooked beautifully and smelled wonderful in the oven, and I pulled it out of the pan with no trouble.
Ran Babes In Toyland while I worked. I discussed the delightful 1961 Disney version of this venerable fantasy musical at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog last November.
Babes In Toyland (1961)
Switched to Jack of All Trades while I turned the rest of the bag of cranberries into Whole Berry Cranberry Sauce. This spoof swashbuckler sitcom somehow managed to squeeze a Thanksgiving episode, "One, Two, Three, Give Me Lady Liberty," into its second season. Emilia is concerned when midget emperor Napoleon builds a massive female statue carrying a torch and claims he intends to give it to the US as a gift. Jack first distracts him with an old-fashioned Thanksgiving dinner, and then with another modern Thanksgiving tradition - football!
Did a Disney cartoon as I ate a fast lunch and did the dishes. Mickey Mouse is "The Grocery Boy" in a black and white short that has him delivering food for Minnie's big dinner. He even helps with the cooking. It's all fun and dancing, until Pluto steals the turkey!
Went out around 12:30 to run a few errands, starting at the Oaklyn Library. Wanted to get this week's volunteering session in there before the holiday. It was a good time to. Between the holiday and the lovely weather, they weren't busy at all. One guy came in to ask if he could hang up a flyer for his local train show. Other than that, the only people there were the librarian and the politicians on CNN. I organized DVDs, Newberry books, and holiday books, then headed out.
Made a few quick stops on the White Horse Pike next. Didn't see what I was looking for at Dollar General, but they had baking soda for really cheap. Been meaning to replace the one I have in the fridge for ages. Picked up a quick birthday gift for my brother Keefe and a Christmas present for my friend Amanda at CVS.
It was too nice to go home right away. The breeze was fresh, the sky was a searing blue, and it was fairly warm for November, in the upper 50's. I rode down to WaWa on the other side of Oaklyn to see if they had Cinnamon Coke. I saw 12-packs of cans at the Acme, but not the bottles. I almost never have problems finding limited-edition soda flavors at WaWa, and today was no exception. They were almost hidden on the end of the Coke cooler. I grabbed a bottle, bought it, and headed out.
(And by the way, if you love Coke and cinnamon and can find a bottle, grab it. It definitely tastes like cinnamon, kind of like a cinnamon stick was brewed in there.)
It was so nice outside, I grabbed my broom and finally swept the porch. I put it off forever, but the leaves had built up around the back of the house near my door and were starting to blow into my kitchen. They really aren't that hard to get rid of. There's enough of a gap between the railings and the porch to fit piles of leaves through. It's harder to do the ends that are blocked off. I really had to stretch to get everything off those.
Ran two shorts while getting organized. "Mickey's Good Deed" is one of my favorite Disney holiday shorts. Mickey and Pluto are facing a homeless Christmas in the midst of the Great Depression. Mickey gives up what means most to him to provide food and toys for a mother and her kittens, and gets a wonderful surprise in the end.
A turkey's trying to escape Pilgrim Porky in "Tom Turk and Daffy." He desperately begs Daffy for help. Daffy hides him, then distracts Porky...until the porcine Puritan gets fed up and decides duck isn't such a horrible thing to have for Thanksgiving dinner.
Worked on writing for the rest of the afternoon. Gene manages to gather enough magic to allow them to watch the evil queen Malade through the reflection in a rain barrel. Yes, she is holding King Allen (Ludden) hostage. She almost throws herself at him in an attempt to get him to give up his kingdom and tell her where his wife and the Legendary Princesses are, but the Password, in this case, is 'no.' He knows Betty is alive, but that's all. He doesn't know where she or the other women and their champions are, and he wouldn't give them away even if he did.
Broke for dinner at 6. Made tuna-noodle casserole from The Mickey Mouse Cookbook while watching Winnie the Pooh: Seasons of Giving. It's a happy holiday in the 100 Acre Woods as Pooh and his friends celebrate the arrival of fall and winter. Rabbit dresses Piglet as a groundhog to find out when spring is, then gets upset when it turns out it's only November. Pooh and the others are ready for a Thanksgiving of haycorns, honey, and hot chocolate ice cream, but Rabbit butts in and tells them that's just not how the big feast is done. After many shenanigans with catching a turkey and exploding pumpkin pies, it's Pooh who finally teaches the finicky bunny that Thanksgiving is about who you're with, not what you eat. At Christmas, Rabbit tells the others the story of how he rescued a baby bird named Kessie, then had a hard time letting her go when she grew old enough to fly south for the winter.
Switched to Muppet Family Christmas as I cleaned up and had dessert. Fozzie's Ma gets quite a shock when he brings all of the Muppet Show performers to her farm for the holidays, and the Sesame Street residents join in later. Ma's nonplussed, to say the least - she was going to go away for the holidays - and Doc and Sprocket from Fraggle Rock aren't happy that their quiet holidays are no longer so peaceful. Kermit's more concerned about Miss Piggy being out in a major snowstorm.
Finished the night after a shower with An American Christmas Carol. Benedict Slade (Henry Winkler) is the owner of a repossession business in a small New England town during the Great Depression. He takes charge of the townspeople's goods to resell with no shame and fires his clerk when he suggests they open the quarry, giving people more money...and him less business. He finally learns a lesson when three strange spirits show him his past working for a small local furnishing business, and his employee's family and ailing son in the present...and what will happen to him in the future if he doesn't change his ways.
Not bad TV movie from the late 70's. Winkler does fairly well as the Scrooge figure under a pound of make-up. Gerry Parkes and David Wayne are better as the older men whose possessions he takes...and who appear as the Ghosts of Christmas Present and Past in his mind to show him how he needs to learn to change and help others.
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