• 2023: The Year In Review

    Each December, I take the time to examine the ups and downs I experienced over the past year. What follows is my personal and professional review of 2023. I:

    * Landed a job as a contract overnight curator of local news for Apple. My contract was just extended.

    * Relaunched A Bit Of Good News.

    * Penned at least 17 journal entries. Must do better next year.

    * Maintained two Instagram accounts: @thejadewalker and @catsofjade, and The Written Word quote service.

    * Read 58 books and completed the 2023 GoodReads reading challenge.

    * Subscribed and read numerous magazines, including Cook’s Country, Cooks Illustrated, Bake From Scratch, Smithsonian Magazine, Scientific American, The Saturday Evening Post, The Writer and TeaTime Magazine.

    * Watched at least 116 TV shows and 61 movies, and listened to many podcasts.

    * Participated in The Society of Professional Obituary Writers, the New Hampshire Writers Guild, the New York City Writers Group, the South Florida Freelancers Group, the Authors Guild, the Writers Guild of America East and the Silent Book Club – Manchester, NH chapter.

    * Launched The Forgotten Books Project and helped to save more than 200 books.

    * Nursed my husband through COVID-19.

    * Planted a large container garden and a wildflower garden (both of which melted in the constant rains and brutal heat), then spent the fall filling our borders and raised beds with 800 tulip and crocus bulbs.

    * Hunkered in the basement during a rare New Hampshire tornado.

    * Spent months searching for our next home, but between the rising interest rates, the lack of stock and an increase in prices, we had no luck. The search continues.

    * Mourned the death of our eldest cat, Georgina Walker-Weir, and my grandfather, Art Carlton.

    * Ended The Blog of Death after 20 years.

    * Finally completed the decades-long payoff of my student loans.

    * Continued to wear these damn braces (and miss the process of enjoying food). Also underwent implant surgery.

    * Finally entered menopause after nearly 3 years of perimenopause. Started taking medicine to deter hot flashes.

    * Suffered from at least 23 migraines and lost 35 days of my life to pain. Average headache duration: 37 hours. (Note: That’s about 10 fewer migraines than last year, so thank you, menopause.)

    * Discovered I have both high blood pressure and low iron. Lots of hospital visits and stabbings ensued as well as a disastrous attempt at an endoscopy/colonoscopy. Now on meds for both conditions.

    * Decorated the inside of our house for Halloween and dressed up as a baker on “The Great British Baking Show.”

    * Decorated the front and inside of our house for Christmas and mailed 40 Christmas cards.

    * Tried many new recipes. New favorites include: mini waffles, chicken saltimbocca, melted butter pound cake with a chocolate ganache glaze, Key lime pie bars, a sausage and potato breakfast bake and a lemon-olive oil tart.

    * Worked my 33rd year as a journalist.

    * Celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary.

    * Turned 50.

     


    End of the year

     

    Goals for 2024

    * Purchase a new home with at least 5 acres of land.

    * Improve my baking/cooking skills.

    * Work on my fiction.

    * Write more blog entries.

    * Continue to grow A Bit of Good News.

    * Read at least 75 books.

    * Sleep at least 7 hours a night.

    * Win the lottery.

  • 2023 sign

    My top 10 favs of 2023: A year spent reading, watching and listening to stories

    Ok, my friends. It’s time to share my annual list of pop culture wonders. Over the past year, I consumed 58 books, 116 TV shows, 61 movies and many podcasts. These were my favorites:

    (Note: Not all were released during the past 365 days.)

     

    MY FAVORITE BOOKS – FICTION
     

    Lessons in chemistry book1. “Lessons in Chemistry” by Bonnie Garmus

    2. “Cult Classic” by Stephen Blackmoore

    3. “Holly” by Stephen King

    4. “Drowning” by T.J. Newman

    5. “Going Zero” by Anthony McCarten

    6. “Hate Machine” by Stephen Blackmoore

    7. “Double or Nothing” by Craig Schaefer

    8. “A Plain-Dealing Villain” by Craig Schaefer

    9. “The Killing Floor Blues” by Craig Schaefer

    10. “Harmony Black” by Craig Schaefer

    (Honorable mentions: “The Castle Doctrine” by Craig Schaefer, “You Are Home” by Catana Chetwynd, “Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting” by Clare Pooley, “All Systems Red” by Martha Wells, “The Maid” by Nita Prose and “Starter Villain” by John Scalzi)

     

    MY FAVORITE BOOKS – NONFICTION
     

    1. true tails of baker and taylor book“The True Tails of Baker and Taylor: The Library Cats Who Left Their Pawprints on a Small Town . . . and the World” by Jan Louch and Lisa Rogak

    2. “National Trust Book of Scones” by Sarah Merker

    3. “What the Dead Know: Learning About Life as a New York City Death Investigator” by Barbara Butcher

    4. “American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century” by Maureen Callahan

    5. “Yours Truly: An Obituary Writer’s Guide to Telling Your Story” by James R. Hagerty

    6. “A Pocketful of Happiness” by Richard E. Grant

    7. “Knave of Spades” by Alan Titchmarsh

    8. “My Hygge Home: How to Make Home Your Happy Place” by Meik Wiking

    9. “Clean & Green: 101 Hints and Tips for a More Eco-Friendly Home” by Nancy Birtwhistle

    10. The Art Thief” by Michael Finkel

    (Honorable mentions: “Kitty Cornered: How Frannie and Five Other Incorrigible Cats Seized Control of Our House and Made It Their Home” by Bob Tarte, “Disappearing Ink: The Insider, the FBI, and the Looting of the Kenyon College Library” by Travis McDade, “Lights Out: A Cyberattack, A Nation Unprepared, Surviving the Aftermath” by Ted Koppel and “The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power” by Deirdre Mask)

    Overall reading ratio: I read 18,034 pages. Books were split 70% fiction to 30% nonfiction and 55% female authors to 45% male authors.

     

     

    MY FAVORITE TV SHOWS
    GBBO1. The Great British Baking Show

    2. Julia

    3. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

    4. Escape to the Country

    5. Ted Lasso

    6. The Diplomat

    7. The Repair Shop

    8. Grand Designs

    9. Britain’s Hidden Villages

    10. Reacher

    (Honorable mentions: Homicide Hunter, Cook’s Country, America’s Test Kitchen, Gardener’s World, Last Week With John Oliver, The Reluctant Traveler, Men in Kilts, Poker Face, Staged, For All Mankind, Foundation, Welcome to Wrexham and Lessons in Chemistry.)

     

    MY FAVORITE MOVIES
     

    Three Thousand Years of Longing movie1. Three Thousand Years of Longing

    2. She Said

    3. Elvis

    4. Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie

    5. John Wick: Chapter 4

    6. The Old Guard

    7. Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret

    8. No One Will Save You

    9. Jim Gaffigan: Dark Pale

    10. Mike Birbiglia: The Old Man and the Pool

    (Honorable mentions: A Man Called Otto, Being Mary Tyler Moore, The Fablemans, Plane, Ghosted, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Call Me Kate, Mike Birbiglia: The New One, 65, Guardians of the Galaxy: Volume 3, The Leftovers, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, The Gray Man and Bullet Train)

     

    MY FAVORITE PODCASTS
     

    The Vinyl Cafe1. The Vinyl Cafe

    2. Backstage at the Vinyl Cafe

    3. GrimmCast

    4. Small Town Dicks

    5. Naked Lunch

    6. BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine Podcast

    7. Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!

    8. Christmas Past

    9. Dear Hank & John

    10. Mobituaries

    (Honorable mentions: Clear + Vivid With Alan Alda, Sidedoor, Something Wild, David Tennant Does a Podcast With…, The Christmas Stocking, Sue Perkins: An Hour Or So With…., Nocturne, Criminal, Death, Sex & Money, Awards Chatter and The Anthropocene Reviewed)

  • 50th birthday

    Fifty years. Where has the time gone?

    My parents were still teenagers when I came along. And my arrival, just five months after their hasty wedding, was quite an experience. According to family legend, my mother was making her first Thanksgiving dinner for the in-laws when she slipped on grease, dropped the turkey and fell into labor. I was born the next evening.

    Every seven years or so, my natal day lands on Thanksgiving. This year is one of those occasions. While I know some people get annoyed when birthday and holiday celebrations combine, I don’t mind. After all, I am with the people and kitties I love. I get to make a feast for them. And once everyone is filled to the gills, I’ll receive presents. What’s not to like?

    The turkey is cooking, the desserts are baked and I’m enjoying a brief intermission before prepping the appetizers and side dishes. I’ve decided to use this time to reflect on the past half-century. The thing that most surprises me is where I ended up. Had you asked my 17-year-old self where I’d be when I turned 50, a home that I own in New England would not have even occurred to her. She had a plan, you see. An ambitious and idealistic one, and she saw no reason why that plan wouldn’t succeed. The world was her oyster and nothing was going to get in her way.

    That young woman loved being a reporter and planned to work in the field of journalism for at least 10 years. Once that was accomplished (and with Pulitzer in hand), she aimed to pen columns that would be syndicated in hundreds of newspapers. Working as an editor was never an option.

    Next, she would write bestselling novels. She’d become bicoastal, renting an apartment on the Upper West Side during the fall and winter and then jetting over to her rental apartment in San Francisco for the spring and summer. Once the cross-country travel grew tiresome, she’d open a bookstore in Manhattan and stay there for the rest of her busy and exciting life.

    A husband was also in the cards — she firmly believed that her soulmate was out there somewhere — but she was willing to wait for him to show up rather than settling for any old bloke. In fact, settling was an anathema to her as she had spent her entire life moving every three years and hoped to continue to do so in the future.

    Needless to say, only some of that plan came to fruition. Seventeen-year-old me could not have predicted that she would experience a terrorist attack, several wars, at least three financial crises, the closure of hundreds of news outlets and mass journalism layoffs, the heavy mental toll of covering decades of violence and receiving death threats on a near-daily basis, the physical toll of aging combined with expensive health care, a global pandemic and the accumulating deaths of those close to her. Nor did she expect that so many Americans would lose interest in reading books — and 17 percent would purposely choose not to read at all.

    If I could finagle a way to return to 1990 and explain what the future holds, I know that young, starry-eyed woman would be most impressed… by my time-traveling skills. She’d also be pretty skeptical and/or disappointed to hear about what was to come and how that would change her outlook on life. I can understand why.

    But I’d also explain that there would be much pleasure to go along with the pain, and that her priorities would change with the times. Most importantly, the afterthought soulmate she planned to meet would turn out to be the man who showed her there was more to life than career advancement. During their time together, he would become her home.

    I have no idea what the next half-century will hold. I have plans, of course. Big plans. However, I’m just old enough to know these goals need to remain flexible, able to change with time and tide.

    So, here’s to the next 50 years, my friends, and happy Thanksgiving!

  • Traditional homemade roasted Thanksgiving Day turkey dinner

    A feast to remember

    Sorry it’s been so quiet here of late. In addition to work (war/shootings/elections/etc.), I’ve been dealing with a few medical issues. But that’s a post for another time.

    Today, I’d like to talk about Thanksgiving. One of my favorite holidays, it’s an annual celebration that seems to be specifically designed for people like me (i.e., those who love to cook, bake and feed others). I always go overboard, filling folks’ bellies to the brim with a mostly traditional feast. And though it’s an exhausting endeavor, I love the whole process, from planning to plate. I just wish I had a second fridge because mine always runs out of room.

    This year we’ll be having a small gathering: M and I and another couple. One of them is a vegetarian. One of them is on a diet that’s gluten-free and low FODMAP. As I started to plan the menu, I told myself that while everyone will need several dishes they can enjoy, I don’t want to spend three days prepping the meal.

    So after researching recipes and whittling down my list, I’ve decided to make only…. 12 dishes! Wait, how the heck did that happen?!?

    Anyway, here’s our menu:

    Appetizers:

    Deviled eggs
    Caprese salad bites

    Main:

    Roasted butternut squash with browned butter and hazelnuts
    Turkey

    Sides:

    Broccoli cheese bake
    Buttered corn
    Mashed potatoes and gravy
    Cranberry sauce
    Biscuits (regular and gluten-free)

    Dessert:

    Pumpkin pie
    GF chocolate cake bites with fresh berries
    Cherries jubilee

    What are you making?

  • autumn leaves

    Quote of the day

    “To say it was a beautiful day would not begin to explain it. It was that day when the end of summer intersects perfectly with the start of fall.” –Ann Patchett