Paul Carter's Christmas Gathering - Galt Lighting of the Night

Paul had lots of people arrive at his home tonight for the annual Lighting of the Night. He did a superb job of preparing for this gathering. Lots of preparation went into making this an especially memorable event. As always, the food was delicious and plentiful. Paul is a very good chef. His barbecue chicken was excellent and the steaks were juicy and tender - with a great barbecue sauce adding just the right flavor to the meat. Most of the guests brought something for the buffet. The desserts were impressive, many of them homemade. Nancy and I especially liked the almond ring that Paul's sister-in-law prepared (see blog picture to the right and at the bottom). Very creative - and even more delicious than a commercial bakery might make.

We enjoyed chatting with the many folks that we had not seen for some time. And of course, the Christmas parade is always an added bonus for this event. The parade passes right in front of Paul's house. Very convenient! Luckily the weather was more accommodating than usual this year - no rain.

We had a great time at Paul's gathering! Thanks, Mr. Carter, for all your hard work. It certainly was a gala holiday affair. You can see a short video of the Galt Lighting of the Night Parade by clicking on the link below.

http://s178.photobucket.com/albums/w275/jimdaviselkgrove/?action=view&current=GaltLightingoftheNightChristmasPara.flv

San Francisco - Christmas Carol

We departed, for what has now become an annual trek to San Francisco, around two o'clock yesterday - to see "A Christmas Carol" at the ACT Theatre near Union Square. The weather was a factor, since it rained heavily for most of the trip, but it actually made it feel more like Christmas. Better than a warm sunny day, for this type of an outing. We walked around Union Square and went into a few stores. While checking out the sites, we found a new restaurant that we really like. We probably passed it a few times during prior visits to San Francisco, but this time we decided to check out the menu that was posted in their window. Nancy zeroed in on the corn beef and cabbage (one of her favorite meals) and I saw that they served large steaks - so it was an easy choice - Johnny Foley's Irish House, here we come! It proved to be a good decision.

The decor in Johnny Foley's is old style San Francisco, meaning it probably looked the same way as it does now, some fifty or more years ago. Being an Irish pub, as well as a restaurant, it had more than a few beer drinkers around the large bar. The restaurant's seating area was almost an afterthought. Nevertheless, the noise wasn't overwhelming, like in many bar restaurants, and the food was top-notch. Nancy enjoyed her corn beef and cabbage and I had a fillet, with a side of mushrooms. The steak was tender, large and cooked to perfection. We capped the meal off with a delicious bread pudding for dessert and vowed that we would return next year for Christmas, if not sooner.

We did swing by the new Tad's during our walk down Powell Street. It has been renovated, but the menu looks the same. The new price for a complete steak meal is $13.49 - a little higher than before the remodel, but still not a bad price for San Francisco. I guess the CES boys and I will have to make a visit before too long.

The performers, all of them and especially the children, were great in "A Christmas Carol". We had very good seats, as I went online early this year to make reservations. The play is a great way to jump start a person into the spirit of Christmas.

The rain was really coming down as we headed home around nine thirty last night. The drive home wasn't too bad, but you had to take precautions. We counted four accidents, as we traveled down a busy I-80 East. People don't want to slow down, even in the heavy rain with low visibility. We just took our time and got home around eleven thirty at night. We were a little tired, from having gotten up early in the morning, so a good night's rest was in order. Got to get ready for a big weekend.This weekend we will be spending time with our friends and enjoying a couple of Christmas buffets. It should be a lot of fun.

The pictures from San Francisco are posted on the right side of the blog page.

Update - Christmas Decorations

Nancy is moving along nicely with the Christmas decorations. Kelly came over today and together Nancy and Kelly decorated the living room tree. It came out looking great - they did a good job. There's still more to do with the tree, so I'm holding off on the pictures, for now. However, you can see the animated Santa table that is finished. The picture is posted to the right. I'm doing some remote wiring, so everything can be started together. The Musical Christmas Carousel is also in place - above the Santa table. I'll show more of these decorations on my blog, after I record the video of the Santa's and the Carousel. It's kind of neat, because you can start all of them by using a remote control. That way you can have music and animation together... if you choose. Cool technology!

Exercise Movies

Below is my list of exercise movies for this week:

Factory Girl

Old Joy

Secret Window

Tape

The Prestige

Time

My favorite movies from last week were Owning Mahowny and 12 and Holding

Updates regarding this week's movies will be made at future blog postings.

Christmas Lights Are Up

Our grand kids came to our house today - to put up the outdoor Christmas lights. They did a good job. We didn't do anything too elaborate this year. We've got some icicles hanging from the roof gutters and some colored lights spread around in various places - shrubs, rose bushes, our big tree, etc. It all looks pretty good. Next comes the indoor Christmas trees and all the interior decorating that we usually do. It will take the rest of the week. We'll probably do a little each day.

It should really start to feel like the Christmas season this week. On Thursday, we drive to San Francisco to see "A Christmas Carol". We finally got a Fas Trak transmitter - so we don't have to go through the Benecia-Martinez and the Bay Bridge toll booths. Actually, Nancy got it for us - at the Costco store in Vacaville. With the new device we can just zip past the toll booths, by using the Fast Track lanes. The transmitter will charge our account. That will save some time.

While we are in San Francisco we plan to check out the new "Tad's" restaurant. I'm really curious about the changes. Tad's had stayed pretty much the same for about fifty years. It will be interesting to see what they have done to the place.

Teriyaki Time

The eventual discovery of a restaurant that has been in one's neighborhood for some time, but for some reason you just never got around to checking out, is kind of a neat thing. Particularly if you also discover that the meal prices are reasonable and for the most part healthy (at least compared to fast food offerings). Oh, and it helps if the meal is also tasty, right! We've recently found such a restaurant and it goes by the name of Teriyaki Time. It has been given and excellent review in the Elk Grove Citizen, actually it's been some time ago, but since we don't subscribe to the Citizen, we missed the review. Probably If we had read the article earlier, we would have ventured over to the restaurant much sooner. Nevertheless, we now enjoy Teriyaki Time's chicken and beef on a regular basis - at least once a week. It is very convenient to home and there is usually only a short wait to get served and to have your takeout packaged and ready to take home. The service is very good.

We have other restaurants in Elk Grove that offer good meals for take out, but none match the price and convenience of our recent discovery of Teriyaki Time. Hopefully, we won't get bored with their meals (that can happen). It's kind of nice to be able to agree on a quick takeout meal, without having to go through the laundry list of options for the dinner meal. I snapped a cellphone picture of the article that was in the Elk Grove Citizen about Teriyaki Time and posted it to the blog. It's too small to read, but I felt like posting it anyway. Good job, Teriyaki Time - and please accept our belated welcome to the neighborhood!

Movie Comments - 12 and Holding

Nancy and I watched and interesting movie tonight. The title is "12 and Holding". Michael Cuesta directs this very unusual and offbeat film about the ordeals of several children who are living in extremely dysfunctional situations. They devise very adult solutions to their dilemmas (both individually and collectively), while they try to find a way out from the complex scenarios that could easily challenge a person twice their age. The child actors are exceptional in their roles and after only a brief time watching the movie the viewer begins to see the young cast members as being much more mature than their chronological age would suggest. This movie is very different and really accentuates the talents of it's youthful cast. Nancy and I liked it very much.