Dec 8 - Christmas Numero Uno

Dark Lindor Ball

"Godot is whatever it is in life that you are waiting for: 'I'm waiting to win the lottery. I'm waiting to fall in love'. For me, as a child, it was Christmas.
At least that eventually came."
- Ian McKellen

  I woke up at a lazy ten o'clock and reluctanty rolled out of bed.  I like my new back exercise, it's easy to do anywhere and I can even manage it first thing.  It was already pretty warm by the time I got up so I flicked on the air-conditioner to make sure the house stayed at a reasonable temperature.  The trouble with the front of my house is that it gets the afternoon sun so it can heat up pretty fast by then and takes ages to cool back down.
  The positive about such a warm day is how quickly laundry gets dried.  I unpacked all my stuff from Tassie and laid the suitcase away, then shoved on a load of work clothes.  While that was going I photographed all of my advent calendar drawers for the rest of the countdown and set up my blog templates from here until Christmas.  It was somewhat torturous photographing all those delicious shiny Lindor Balls without eating any of them!
  About noon the washing was done and I hung it out.  It was very hot and getting rather steamy.  The prickly heat rash didn't come back but my arms definitely tingled and itched in the sun.  I was very glad to be hanging it out before the sun really got under the porch and I scrubbed my arms with an exfoliating glove once I got back into the cool house.
  After that I continued on prepping blogs and the stripped and made my bed.  I had a little light lunch, knowing that tonight's Christmas dinner would be a big one, and then braved the heat once more to check on the laundry.  3pm and it was bone dry.  This was brilliant as it meant that tonight I could wear some of the stuff I had washed and also that I could wash the bed linen straight away.
  So on went another load of washing, in came this morning's, and then before the second load was done I also stripped and made the spare room bed ready for the arrival of Gub & Co.!  I was cutting it a bit fine by the time I hung out the second load but it was only sheets so I had it hung out in a jiffy, threw my going out clothes on, grabbed my stuff and jumped in the car and headed to Mr Smart's.  I only arrived about fifteen minutes later than expected I think.
  Mr Smart and I set about putting things in the car and the heat, without the airconditioning of the car, was stifling.  As we returned for our final trip out to the car Mr Smart Snr shouted a halloo from the living room and he asked me what it was like outside.  I had seen some grey clouds as I drove over and I shouted back that it was still horribly hot but that I thought a change might be coming.  Just as I said it, a gust of cool wind hit the house and rushed in through the windows.  Mr Smart looked at me like I had summoned it!
  As we walked outside again to head to Mr Smart's sister's house for the first of many Christmas get-togethers, the temperature dropped almost instantly to what felt like a very pleasant 24ish degrees.  It was an amazingly rapid change.  The wind kept up too, extremely blustery like it had been on our last day in Tassie.  The trees were visibly bent to the wind as we drove the short distance to our dinner locale.
  We got there early, about half past five, which was great.  I was a little nervous as I hadn't met any of the other guests before so it gave us a chance to play with Mr Smart's nephew and chat with his sister and her husband before everyone else arrived.  Arriving early also meant I would get to meet people one at a time as they arrived, a much easier situation than meeting them all at once!
  I gave Mr Smart's nephew a bamboo train set for Christmas.  The three carriages spell out his name.  He seemed to really enjoy it and when it fell apart going down the stairs he grasped how to put it back together pretty much instantly!  Not bad for a two year old.  He ever put all the letters of his name back in the right carriages.  He's an adorable little tyke.
  People started to arrive about an hour after we had and arrived gradually, just as I had hoped.  It gave me a chance to get to know each person a little before the next arrived, and more importantly, to commit everyone's names to memory!  There were five new faces and names to remember and they were all lovely and unique people.  I was made to feel very welcome.  It was really great not to feel that I didn't get the jokes or understand the stories.  I felt very included.
  We ate a delicious entree standing around the kitchen bench on the bar stools from little Asian-style takeaway boxes done up for Christmas.  It was a gorgeous serving style and suited the dish very well.  I intend to steal the style for prawn cocktails at Bertie and my Christmas lunch in a fortnight!

  After entree the final guests arrived and before long we were all seated at the beautifully set dining room table, the conversation and drink flowed, the food was plentiful and divine.  Mr Smart and I both overate a little but not to the point of having to waddle anywhere afterwards.  Everything was so delicious, the pork and crackling particularly so.  The noise of nine people happily crunching away was a pleasant one indeed.

  After the main course, we all participated in a Kris Kringle draw.  Everyone had brought a Kris Kringle gift and they were all put into an improvised Santa Sack (a pillow case).  We all drew numbers to see in which order we would pick from the bag.  Mr Smart got number two and I got number three.  The idea was that if you wanted to you could swap yours for something people before you had already received.  No one took up that option for which I was rather grateful.  I loved mine!  Rosa's Farm, a cookbook by Rosa Mitchell.  It looks fabulous!
  It was soon on to dessert and "Wow!" what a dessert!  Delicious, creamy but not too sweet, just right to finish off the meal with the now traditional chocolate Shiraz.  It was a delicious raspberry and pistachio semifreddo, quite similar to this one.  It was divine, garnished with fresh raspberries and mint leaves.  I could've eaten at least three slices but I didn't.  I contented myself with the one as I was already quite quite full.
  All night Mr Smart's sister was panicking about 'pulling off' the meal she had planned but I think all present would agree that it was a rousing success.  I was always confident it would be.  For all her worry, she is a marvellous hostess.  I've never had anything other than a great time at her place.

  Today's food was:

• Lunch was 130g of wombok and noodle salad with three hard-boiled eggs.
• Afternoon snack was a 170g Dairy Farmers Thick & Creamy Field Strawberries 98% fat free yoghurt topped with flaked almonds.
• Dinner was an entree of four small and delicious Thai-style fish cakes cooked on the barbecue, served with snow pea shoots and a yoghurt (I think) dressing.  The main course, the pièce de résistance, was a perfectly cooked pork roast with great lumps of crunchy crackling and a whole snapper wrapped in banana leaves cooked on the barbecue!  It came with sides of brown rice, green salad and a spicy gingery dressing for the pork.  I ate what's shown in the picture below plus a bit more pork and crackling and two more small pieces of bread.
• Dessert was a slice of raspberry and pistachio semifreddo.
• Drinkies were, a glass of Moscato, three Cosmopolitans (two weak, one not so weak) and a very small half glass of chocolate Shiraz.
• Today's advent calendar Lindor Ball was dark chocolate.

  Some of you may be thinking, 'Golly gosh, that seems rather a lot of drinking for Jess' and yes, it was.  I wouldn't say I was drunk as I drank that over four hours, but Mr Smart would tell you that quite a bit of it was in the first hour or so.  It's his fault for introducing me to Moscato!  Yes my friends, it seems that Moscato may well be a gateway liquor.  I seem to have developed a taste for it as a social lubricant.  I was however, very careful that I was ok to drive before I set off for home with Mr Smart.
  As you may have realised, I didn't write the blog immediately on returning home.  We had a wonderful night, a resoundingly brilliant start to the silly season, and I didn't want to interrupt it by hopping on the computer for hours.  I'm sure you understand!
  Here's to wonderful silly season.  I'll drink to that!
  Jess