Poor Wandering One

Rain or no rain, I had DVDs due at the Haddon Township Library, and I promised Erica I'd volunteer at the thrift shop in Collingswood. I began with the latter. The shop wasn't busy, thanks to the lousy weather, but there was still plenty to do. I helped clear off several racks so two of the older volunteers could bring out more women's blouses and sweaters and arranged Christmas items.

I finally found some good records at the thrift shop today. I haven't seen records there in months. Amid classical albums and obscure 60s singers were several Christmas records, soundtracks, and cast albums, some fairly rare. I ended up with four cast albums, two soundtracks, a comedy double album with selections from everyone from Stan Freburg ("St. George and the Dragonet") to Lenny Bruce, and one of the Great Songs of Christmas holiday albums. The cast albums were the 60s Sherlock Holmes musical adventure Baker Street, the early 70s hit Purlie, a studio album for Show Boat, and the 1981 Broadway revival cast of The Pirates of Penzance. The soundtracks are for Easy Rider and the 1966 TV remake of Rogers and Hammerstein's Cinderella.

I left Erica's around quarter of 1. I wasn't that hungry, so I just stopped by the Philadelphia Pretzel Factory, a small shop further down Haddon Avenue specializing in soft pretzels, and bought myself a bottle of water and a pretzel shaped like a candy cane. It was warm and pretty tasty. My next stop was Walgreens. I was hoping to find socks for Jessa, but no luck. They had a much better selection of WebKinz this time, everything from Pandas to Yorkies, but I'm really trying to wait for Christmas.

I went straight to the Haddon Township Library next. It was surprisingly quiet for a rainy day. I guess everyone opted to stay inside instead. I did help a mother find a Wonder Pets DVD for her little girl (the only one they had there that day) and reorganized the American Girls books, which were in lousy shape. And yes, I returned the DVDs. Didn't see anything else I liked, though.

I made quick stops at Super Fresh, and then Dollar Tree for two teddy bears. I dropped one bear in the toy box at Dollar Tree for a charity that gives toys for the children of soldiers overseas. The other teddy bear went in a Toys For Tots box at the Oaklyn Library, which was my last stop for the day.

I spent the rest of the evening working on editing this month's Monkees role-play (which we should finish tomorrow) and listening to my new records. The rain had been on and off all day. It was light as I walked home, but picked up again shortly after I got in and has poured ever since. It was really rather cozy at home this evening, between the rain and the music and my tree all lit up with the little colored lights.

Run Run Rudolph

I was asked to come to work early today, around 12:30PM, and work for seven hours. That's fine. I need to make up the hours lost that dead week after Thanksgiving, and the morning and early afternoon shifts have lost several cashiers lately - two women are out on disabilities with a broken foot and a bad back (and the one with the back may not be able to return), and one woman apparently came in, felt sick, and ended up leaving very early. Work was steady-to-dead, to real problems other than that lack of help. As two other co-workers pointed out during my break, it probably won't be really busy until Sunday and Monday, when people leave the malls and start buying their Christmas dinners and all the little things they forgot the week before.

This did mean I had to rush the things I planned for today a bit. I did my biscotti this morning. I found the recipe in the Italian Farmhouse Cookbook, by Susan Hermann Loomis. To be honest, many of the recipes in this book are a little complicated for me or require items I can't easily find, but I've made the simple biscotti recipe for Christmas since about 2003. Instead of making them into the hard rusks most people dunk into hot drinks, I roll them into candy cane and wreath/ornament shapes and sprinkle them with colored sugar and hot cinnamon candies. They're wonderfully crunchy with a hint of sweetness...and they still taste great dunked in tea.

I also made a very fast trip to the Oaklyn Library on my bike to return Annabelle's Wish (it's due tomorrow, but I won't have the time to return it then) and drop off the Silly Putty I bought at Target on my Christmas shopping trip with Amanda in the library's Toys For Tots box.

Amanda and I started doing Toys For Tots the year after we started doing our shopping trip. Amanda has no very young relatives, and she wanted to buy toys...so why not do it for a less-fortunate child? I loved the idea, and I've tried to do it whenever I can find a box every year since.