Sunday Salon: Slo Mo Sandy

Moving a little slow today.  We hosted our semi-annual(ish) Polish fest last night with friends.  I made pierogies, apple carrot salad, and a hunter's stew called Bigos.  You basically throw whatever wild game you can find into a stew with cabbage, mushrooms, sauerkraut and bacon...last night's had wild boar, venison, pheasant, elk and kielbasa.  My husband got distracted making drinks while grilling kielbasa and ended up torching all of it.  So that was nice.  We still had lots of fun and ended up going to bed pretty late.

It's been another busy week.  Both kids had the sickness, especially my son.  Head cold and fever type of thing.  Nothing gets done when they are home with me.  We had more rain as well, which just encourages sloth and burrowing under the covers.

In a couple of weeks my daughter turns 16!  Ack!  She won't actually get her license until August because she waited to get her permit, so I don't have that stress yet.  But this is a big deal, so she and I have been planning the festivities.  We are going to take her to probably the nicest restaurant in town, Victoria and Albert's at Disney's Grand Floridian.  And then she and I are going to have a spa weekend.  You generally have to be 16 to participate in the regular treatments, so she has been anxiously waiting for this.  This girl loves to be pampered.

My son and I finally got out to see Nebraska, which was one of the last Oscar movies we hadn't seen.  We loved it.  It so much reminded us of where I grew up in Indiana.  Very well-acted, sometimes thoughtful and sometimes hilarious.  In my opinion, the only chance this movie has of winning anything is with June Squibb, but I'm not sure if she can compete with the girl from 12 Years a Slave.  At home, we have been working our way through House of Cards (Netflix streaming), which is about toxic politics in DC starring Kevin Spacey.  We also just started watching Game of Thrones.  So much stuff to obsess over!

Reading-wise, I'm STILL plunking my way through "Winter's Tale".  I'm actually at 92%, so I should finish soon.  This story is very complicated, and a little other-worldly.  I'm not sure I love it, but it is holding my interest.  The movie comes out next week, and I'm starting to get a sinking feeling.  I just don't know how in the world this is going to translate to the screen.  I can tell you one thing though.  The next book I read is going to be less than 300 pages.  I feel like I'm making this book into a career.

On audio I finished Lee Child's "A Wanted Man", the 17th installment in the Jack Reacher series.  Hey, you know what?  In a week, I won't be able to tell you more than two or three things about the book, but whatever.  They entertain me!  I also listened to "Every Day" by David Levithan and absolutely fell in love with the book.  I just did start "Zealot" by Reza Aslan, a book about the historical Jesus of Nazareth.  It is fascinating, but almost too much fact exploding into my ears.  It is hard to absorb everything.

So now that all the remnants of last night have been cleaned up, I think my husband and I are going on a very long walk!  Our walks have been getting pretty ambitious.  Yesterday we did about 5 miles, but today is probably going to be longer.  For once it isn't raining and the weather is gorgeous.  After that, I intend to do some laundry and finish my book!  Hope everyone has a great Sunday.  Let me know if you are doing anything fun!