Skip to main content

What's In A Name?

Happy New Year! I'm sorry if you gave up on me. I actually gave up on my ability to keep this blog going, and today's post doesn't exactly mean I'm back to writing regularly. When I started teaching full time in September, I knew life would get busy; what I didn't anticipate was having to get used to flying by the seat of my pants all the time. As a part-time teacher, I had lots of time to prepare my lessons. Granted, this meant that if I really calculated my hourly pay, I'd have had a hard time justifying working at all. Looking on the bright side, I don't work twice as much as before, mostly because there just aren't enough hours in the day. Looking on the dark side, I work an awful lot and most days I am planning right up to the moment my students walk in the door. I have had to get used to not always having a clear picture of what to do next, but I have learned that this is not always a bad thing. My students have become my guide far more, and we have had some amazing lessons together because of this spontaneity. I think I have learned to really embrace carpe diem.

I've been on vacation since December 21st. Twelve glorious days. No alarms at 5:45am, no rushing around the house to get out the door on time, no real substantial planning. Carpe diem, baby. Carpe diem. Shortly after Christmas, I invited a group of friends over for New Year's Eve. My daughter was heading back to school that morning, and so, I theorized, this would help me bypass that empty feeling every time she leaves. Now, the old me would have started planning days in advance, making sure I had all the details covered for our shindig. But this year, I vowed to enjoy every day I had with my family intact, and this meant putting my party planning on hold until the last minute because I would be returning from the airport only hours before all the guests would arrive. Suppressing the panic that comes from one who likes to plan in advance wasn't easy.

Lucky for you, spontaneity and panic brought out a great new drink recipe, and what's even more amazing is that I made the whole thing up myself! My friend LeaAnn gave me this bottle of gin for my birthday from a local Woodinville distillery. Building on a drink that's commonly known as the Pamplemmousse (the French word for grapefruit), I added some Prosecco and a sugar cube to intertwine the Pamplemmousse and a Champagne Cocktail. The combination is really tasty and unique. I'm sorry I didn't get this to you in time for your own New Year's Eve celebration, but 2015 is just beginning. You're bound to find a reason to be spontaneous and create this drink. The only problem is that I haven't been able to come up with a name, so please chime in if you have some ideas. Here's to a fabulous new year. May all your unplanned moments create some lasting memories.

The (as of yet) Un-Named Drink

1 oz. gin
1 oz. fresh squeezed grapefruit juice
1/2 oz. St.-Germain liqueur (see my recipe for G&T with St.-Germain)
1/2 oz. fresh squeezed lemon juice
Prosecco
sugar cube
lemon peel curl for garnish

Place gin, grapefruit juice, St. Germain, and lemon juice in a shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and then strain into a champagne glass (fluted or the Marie Antoinette style) that has a sugar cube in the bottom. Pour Prosecco on top. Garnish with a twisted lemon peel (click on the Marie Antoinette style link for a lesson on how to do this). Sip and savor.

Comments

  1. UnknownJanuary 2, 2015 at 2:51 AM

    Jo, I did miss your blog o g but hoped your absence was because you were having fun. I am not sure I would call what you are doing as "fun" but it does sound challenging with a few life lessons thrown in.
    Happy New Year to you and your family!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Cheaper by the Dozen

Beautiful, aren't they? There's something about farm fresh eggs that almost makes me want to quit my day job and become a lady farmer. Almost. For now I will settle for my son's occasional post as head keeper of a friend's menagerie, which happens to include ten chickens. Fortunately for me, these chickens are prolific producers, so when our friends go on vacation, we are the happy recipients of many  beautiful eggs. At first we revel in the most scrumptious omelets and scrambled concoctions. By day four or five, however, I admit to often having egg overload. Not this time. As soon as these eggs started appearing, I began thinking about Ramos Gin Fizzes because when made the old fashioned way, they contain an egg white. If you're like me, this news would normally bring a halt to my experimentation. But my new stock of farm fresh eggs gave me reason to carry on because they came from chickens that I have watched cluck and roost, and that makes all the differen...
Post a Comment
Read more

State of Mind, State of Body

Many years ago I competed in triathlons, and one race always sticks out in my mind. Actually, it's one moment from one race. I was on the bike leg, which for me was always my strongest. As I was riding along and happily gaining ground on all the folks who were stronger swimmers, another woman came up alongside and said, "Hey, nice bike." We chatted for half a minute about the finer points of Cannondale bikes, and then she sped off. When I looked down at her calf muscle and saw the permanent pen markings that indicated her age, I read five zero, fifteen years my senior! Humbled? Yes. Impressed? Very much so. I have long been drawn to older, fit folks. If you've been a longtime reader of my blog, you might remember when I wrote about George Garside and the Auckland Cycle Touring Association . This was a group of incredibly fit 60, 70, and 80 year old men I was privileged to ride with once, and the experience definitely left its mark. These men took their fitness serio...
6 comments
Read more

Getting To the Root of the Matter

Curcuma longa is the botanical name for a plant whose rhizome harnesses incredible healing power. We know it as turmeric, the bright orange spice that is produced from the plant's root, and it has been used for over 4,500 years as an important part of Ayurveda, one of the world's oldest forms of medicine. Like snow to the native people of Alaska, turmeric has over a hundred different terms in the Ayurvedic world. Jayanti , one victorious over diseases, relates to the lengthy list of health maladies this powerful spice has been used to fight: inflammation, cholesterol, heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, digestion, gallstones, cuts and burns, colds and sore throats, and (my favorite) leech bites. Matrimanika , beautiful as moonlight, is another name for the versatile spice and refers to its historical use in Indian wedding ceremonies where the bride and groom rub a paste with turmeric all over their bodies, providing them each with a special glow and promise of matrimonial pr...
2 comments
Read more