We slept in until the ranting alarm clock woke us, ready to chivvy James off to work. I had some oatmeal, then went to Michaels at Town Center. They had a good deal of Christmas and other things on discount, but I only bought some cording, along with a block of wood. Michaels sells these blocks of wood, 10 inches long and in various widths, for whittling. I used one to make a stand for my gingerbread people and tree last year. This year my new gingerbread decorations and the Santa cook looked rather lost sitting by themselves next to this display. So I will use this block of wood, together with a smaller block of wood, to make a "stair-steps" type of display for next year.

Next went to JoAnn and used my 50 percent off coupons to buy a couple more electric candles to make a little winter display. I have some snowflake stick-ons to decorate them, but couldn't find a little silvery "pick" to highlight the arrangement. I have the mirror to put it on at home (LOL...if I can find it in the disorder of my craft room).

Before I left the Town Center area I stopped at Borders and picked up a Victorian mystery called A Bright Blue Death.

I came home through I-75 and visited the Michaels on Cobb Parkway. I found more decorative cording, some little wood cutouts I need for a project, some rub-ons with chickadees and with snowflakes, and a little silvery berry pick for the candle arrangement. If I didn't want these items so much I might have dumped them and left; I, and at least a dozen other people, were stuck in a line behind a woman who was returning two reels of ribbon in that checkout line because the customer service desk wasn't open. I felt bad for the woman; she was very embarrassed at the line building up behind her while waiting through the lengthy and cumbersome Michaels return routine and before she left she actually apologized to me. It wasn't her fault; there were at least 20 people in two lines—they needed to open up more lines.

I made one more stop to pick up something special for James, then came home via Dollar General, since I needed a battery for the smoke alarm in the garage. On the paperback spinner, I found two intriguing-sounding mysteries for a dollar, one featuring Sherlock Holmes teaming with Father Brown and another about a forensic geologist. It's amazing, surveying the shelves at Borders and Barnes & Noble, and even surfing through Amazon, how many "themed" mysteries there are now. There are knitting mysteries, bookstore mysteries, needlework mysteries, Renaissance Fair mysteries, various Victorian mystery series, cooking mysteries, cleaning mysteries, medieval mysteries, bed-and-breakfast mysteries, 1930s mysteries, herbal mysteries, wartime mysteries, dog-centric mysteries, cat-centric mysteries, mysteries taking place in various parts of the country, country mysteries, city mysteries, musical mysteries...and many more.

I had snagged a can of Progresso "light" chicken noodle soup at Dollar General, and had that for lunch with some oyster crackers. Now I am dubbing off FDR: A Presidency Revealed. This is a great documentary: marvelous 1930s and 1940s color footage that I've never seen anywhere else before, accompanied by narrative by Eleanor Roosevelt and commentary by the president's grandson Curtis "Buzzie" Roosevelt, historian Thomas Fleming, Geoffrey Ward (author of several Roosevelt biographies), Doris Kearns Goodwin (No Ordinary Time), Hugh Gallegher (FDR's Splendid Deception, about the true extent of his polio and its effects), and others.

Labels: books, crafts, shopping, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 4:26:00 PM

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