various problems

So I managed to FINALLY send out my Christmas letter (didn't send one last year, what with surgeries and all sorts of problems), today, I had had the sense to at least re-name it something like holiday season 2009-2010. But then after I had everything addressed, sealed and stamped, I realized I had made a big mistake in the letter. The url for one of my blogs is seriously wrong. PIA...

It's so cold here; we're in a serious deep-freeze. Hasn't been above freezing for awhile, and it's not going to be again for a good week. Pipes are frozen in Martin's cabin. I now have a thermometer in the pantry (next to the kitchen) as I am curing duck breast prosciutto in there. It is 33 degrees Fahrenheit in there. The heat pump in the kitchen (it's so far from the boiler pipes that heat from the boiler does no good in the kitchen anyway...) doesn't work most of the time when it's this cold outside, so most of the time it's about 45 degrees in the kitchen. I won't discuss rooms like the bedrooms. The back porch (lots of glass, a heat pump) is for some reason almost comfortable most of the daylight hours. It's almost WARM in the den, as I have been keeping a fire in the wood burning fireplace insert almost all the time. The frugal streak in me has actually quit worrying about how much trouble I have to go to (and how many starter sticks, etc. to use) to get it going again when it goes out. Fortunately, we seem to have a good supply of wood, as we lose big limbs and/or trees whenever there's a nasty storm.

Some days it's too cold to cook in the kitchen, but fortunately we don't seem to have any frozen pipes in the house (thanks to all the cellars...). It's supposed to be nasty cold for at least another week. We might as well be in Michigan...

So there...

Cheers, Lillie