Thanksgiving Break

Our school district calendar always allows for the full Thanksgiving week off. I'm grateful for that. It fits, somehow, to have the full week off to prepare the meal and receive family, or to travel and go see family. In any case, I'm glad.

Friday was pretty hectic. The kids had pretty much reached their limit and came in to school loud and boisterous. Teachers were tired, and we were all just looking forward to a good week off.

So here I am, inaugurating the week at 5:30 am, in the dark and quiet, with a fancy coffee I made with whipped cream and cinnamon.

I'd mentioned a few days ago about the Classics Club, an online reading club that blogs about what classics we are reading. Every once in a while the Club moderator puts forth a 'game' called Classics Spin. You list 20 classic books you always wanted to read but haven't yet. Maybe they were too intimidating, or to long, or too intellectually demanding, or you just have put it off and now it's 10 years later and you still haven't read that book you always wanted to. . So you make a list of 20 and number them. The Club 'spins' an imaginary wheel and lands on a number. They publish the number. You read the book you listed at that number by December 31 and post whether you met the challenge or not. It's very casual and lots of fun.

The number yesterday was 4 and that was Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon published in 1862. It was Braddon's most successful and well-known novel. Critic John Sutherland (1989) described the work as "the most sensationally successful of all the sensation novels". The plot centres on "accidental bigamy" which was in literary fashion in the early 1860s. Thanks, Wikipedia, for the summary.

Cover of an edition of Lady Audley's Secret
pre-1900.

I've got a few things to read this week. My Biblical Doctrine study, a detective novel called Blind Justice by James Scott Bell, start Lady Audley, and TeaTime Magazine.

For now I'm sitting in the pre-dawn, listening to Pandora Christmas Hymns, sipping my sweet and hot coffee, hearing the coffee pot tick, the gas hiss, and cats snore, and all's well on the first moments of Thanksgiving break.

"My spontaneity is carefully planned."

I spent the requisite number of years launching myself out into the world in the cold, dark morning hours, driving to some job so I could earn my pay. I still do. So when a day comes along, like Saturday (not Sunday, that's church in the morning), or a holiday, I looooove to stay at home in the morning. I make the coffee and anticipate being able to drink it from a cup at my leisure. Not gulping from a thermos in the car. Staying in my pajamas is a decadence that feels just right, as the sun climbs through the sky and angles its rays into my brightening apartment.

Today was one of those days. School is out for the rest of the week due to Thanksgiving holiday. I stayed up last night until 12:30, feeling like a kid who's getting away with something. I slept like a baby until 6:30 and then, sighing blissfully, laughed at the clock. "Today you have no power over me!" bwa ha ha!

I got up at 8 and shuffled to the kitchen, and first order of business is making coffee and booting up computer. They are a tie in terms of importance for my well-being, I wish I could do both at the same time. As I settled down with my first steaming cup at 8:20, the phone rang.

Hmmm, that's early, I thought.
"Let's go vote!" my friend said. (Georgia is having a runoff for senator. Early voting starts today.)
"What?" Information doesn't register before coffee circulates. It is a known fact. Ask any biologist. Make sure to ask after he's had some coffee.
"No, thanks, I am not dressed or even showered."
"I'll give you 15 minutes, let's go! We'll buy donuts and coffee later!" Honk Honk
"You're in the driveway??"
"Yes, c'mon!"
"Naw, I think I will stay right here."
"I thought you were more spontaneous than that!"
"My spontaneity is carefully planned."

They were persistent, though his wife had said to him that I wouldn't be going because she knew I want to stay home in the mornings on my days off. Now, it is so sweet that a couple of friends think of me as they drive by and want to scoop me up for coffee. Real sweet!

But before my coffee, I might as well be a dog.