Early Winter with No Wonderland

As I process the shock to my system from our unseasonably deep chill starting with Thanksgiving, I had too much time to mull that unexpected and unwelcome transition. Here comes a hodgepodge of stuff, which begins with noting that Thanksgiving weekend was absolutely fantastic for the joys found inside the house.

But that holiday Thursday initiated an extended, never-ending, sub-normal, and occasionally wet-and-dreary weather pattern. Saturday’s mid-20s morning temps were quite a deviation even for late November, Sunday never got above 41°F, and Monday hit only a high of 43°F.

Sunday and Tuesday were cold and rainy. Sunday’s hourly forecast had the added cruelty of lying to us: the reduction in precip was promised in each coming hour only to jump back up to rainy certainty. Tuesday was ugly at least for the first half of the day.

It was cold and dreary enough, and of course this old house can be a bit drafty; the smart move was to bring Grandmother’s amazing quilt out of its summer storage drawer and place it comfortingly over the master bed!

That was just in time for the unrelief of Wednesday, bright and sunny but temps at freezing. It’s the time of year for blooms to emerge from some of the camellia bushes, so here’s how they were looking.

It wasn’t too cold for two squirrel-focused house canines, who seemed unbothered by 32°F as long as yard pests remained active across branches and power lines above.

Once evening rolled around, and they’d had their supper, they were ready for their quiet hangout napping up on the third floor, and I was ready to continue working my way back through the first season of the original Mission Impossible television series.

The final full (and Super!) moon of 2025 arrived at dinnertime that Thursday, but we had a winter weather system moving in that obscured it. I’m glad I went ahead and snagged its rise on the clear evening prior.

On the first Friday of December, local schools were closed or on a virtual day schedule in cautious expectation of a mix of wintry weather that did not materialize here. Instead, on a mizzly nasty dreary day where afternoon temps eased down into the low 30s, it was a delightful lunch on Fourth Street with a longtime social studies colleague, followed by an afternoon home movie hang up in the mancave with our new neighbor. It was a Friday that communicated clearly: once in, stay in! Sound directive, that.

Let’s roll it all together in the appropriate finale of the Winston-Salem Christmas Parade in the stark chill of early dark that first Saturday of December.

Because of the location of the Roediger House, we witness much of the staging of floats and performers and fancy or vintage vehicles.

This year’s event seemed to draw in huge crowds in spite of how cold it was. Or maybe because of it? I’ve strolled the route in past years and practiced my usual restraint in 2025 by stepping only up to the main intersection by the house to grab a few documentary pics. I do think folks had a fine time.

Meal No. 3953: Smothered Pork Chops with Onion-Thyme Gravy

The supper time gets more special when Kristen and Mookie come over, as happened Sunday evening. An old favorite (there are plenty to choose from!) was resurrected: smothered braised pork chops in onion-thyme gravy. I also made Brussels sprouts gratin and roasted spiced potato cubes. It was a super spread that seemed to please all participants. We still left a little room for the last of the perfectly pillowy cinnamon rolls from the previous evening.

In the in-between hangtime up on the third floor, there was this very sweet moment when Kristen was flanked by two very sleepy and very contented pups.

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"Smothered Pork Chops," by Erika Bruce. In Cook's Country, April/May 2011, p. 22-23.

"Brussels Sprouts Gratin," by Alison Roman. From Cooking on newyorktimes.com.

Storms Break Up the Dry Spell

We had us a fine run of fantastic (and sometimes almost cool!) weather as August finished out and we enjoyed the Labor Day weekend and September started humanely. But then came September 4th and the storms whipped up and the rains fell heavily. But I'll be darned if it didn't provide the cutest shot of Sumner and Scarlett watching it all from the huge window in the pool table area that looks out toward Broad Street!

Meal No. 3912: Baked Spaghetti

Almost all of our regular crew was here last Saturday night for our latest gathering, which proved to be another great evening. For dinner, we had the house special of baked spaghetti, using a recipe obtained almost 30 years ago from my dear friend Cindy. We also had salads on the side, with a choice of the housemade dressings: either creamy Caesar or Thousand Island.

We relocated upstairs for a movie night, featuring the 2020 sleeper cult hit, Dinner in America. This fun flick was marvelously entertaining, a different drummer's beat, and a wild ride for our weekend hang time. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

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"Baked Spaghetti," by Margaret Coalson via Stick Coulson, 13 July 1997.

"Thousand Island Dressing," which was based on a version from Graybert on GeniusKitchen.com.

A Class of 83 TV

Above you can see the television upgrade that sits in daunting repose on that terrific entertainment center my good friend and UNC suitemate Ronnie built for us.

That rascal looks huge and hulking to me, in all its svelte thinness (when viewed from the side). But it’s sort of a monstrosity, as I consider what it looked like as the delivery guys brought it in, and then as it sat waiting to be unboxed and set up.

The visiting crew from Oklahoma talked us into upgrading to Apple TV for managing our streaming as well. After two Amazon Firesticks that never met expectations, and with which we could never get the audio to sync, this was an overdue reckoning.

While I find it pretty troubling how short might be the lifespan of major electronics, and knowing we might have limped along another year or so or more with our current LG OLED TV, its screen had developed some annoying green line burn-ins and some major green splotching across multiple areas that did not seem to be remediable. Costco happened to have a nice price on this model with a larger screen (83 in) for less than I’d previously shelled out back in 2018 for the departing model (55 in), and a summer special on Costco Direct added mightily to the savings.

I have to say: I would love for this to be the last TV I have to buy, but that’s a ridiculous wish. I definitely can’t imagine thinking any larger than this would ever be needed even in the generous spaces of the mancave. (And yes: it's diagonal measurement lets me pay title tribute to my high school graduation year.) Just having to dispose of all the styrofoam might be a sufficient disincentive!

But the three hours it took once it was plugged in and turned on to properly log in, to load all the apps, to sign in to all the streaming services, to manage Smart connectivity, to go in and out of menu options and settings and aborted configurations, to get booted out of the LG app every time it told me to connect to some other app’s features (and then to have to start all over again)...to have inexplicable “unverified errors” even from the Apple TV set-up...

It was one of those evening’s to regret that I mostly have given up drinking.

UNCSA Film Project No. 4!

What a pleasure it was on the final Sunday of February to again find the house full of the energy and spirit of a group of young filmmakers, actors, and design and production students from the UNC School of the Arts. On this latest opportunity for the Roediger House to serve as a location, a smaller-scale class film project was staged and shot up in the third-floor mancave, with a storyline revolving around a slumber party amongst an improv troupe.

Beginning before 8 am with the earliest arrivers, followed by a burst of subsequent timely entrants, it was once more delightful to watch these innovators work expeditiously to create a suitable setting and then give life to a vision for a story. (The pool table was a useful distractor for the actors while the crew set the stage and adorned the space and plotted the tech elements.)

It is essential that these remarkable students feel welcome, and I do not worry about the care that they take as they briefly occupied the upper floor. They work so well together and seem to enjoy one another. UNCSA has such a tremendous set of program offerings and it is awesome to get to witness their exemplary training put into action.

While the students were working away upstairs for this short film, I found comfort in the kitchen, with attentions focused on a cinnamon streusel coffee cake. It baked away in the late morning hours, leaving me free to respond as needed to any questions or assistance for the crew.

While I might try to assign to these delightful young people culpability for my butter error with the recipe, the truth is I am solely at fault: I'd had cinnamon rolls too much on my mind lately and mixed the melted butter into the cinnamon-brown sugar center filling instead of into the flour-cinnamon-sugar streusel topping. Aaargh. How can we put one foot in front of the other when there has been too much butter added into a confection like this?

Previous UNCSA Production: "Beaks Bloody"

Next UNCSA Production: " "Star-Crossed"

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"Cinnamon Streusel Coffee Cake," by the always excellent PJ Hamel of King Arthur Baking.

Meal No. 3802: Million Dollar Chicken Spaghetti

I have no idea how long it's been since I actually went to the grocery store. Actually, typing that propelled me to look it up, and I haven't shopped at Harris Teeter since January 20 (I'm drafting this on February 14). But I finally made my way to Costco last Thursday for a huge restocking shopping trip, and that let me also come home with a rotisserie chicken. Ah, but what to do with it! I decided it was a night for million dollar chicken spaghetti, using a new recipe, and I'm not sure it was the best choice.

Too much goop, too expansive an ingredients list, and it overwhelmed instead of melding...but the evening was saved by the latest batch of incredible big bubbly focaccia, which was stupendous.

We enjoyed some bright sunshine that day, even though it remained cool. I quietly celebrated the first sighting of tulips pushing up from the winter ground, as noted above. Spring can't get here fast enough for me, and while we're not supposed to wish our lives away, looking ahead to better weather also means that more of the misery of the Trump Administration will also have passed.

The downstairs has been switching between being chilly and being up to temp, while the downstairs HVAC system's final few days of "service" were playing out. Before Trump tariffs drive the cost of a new HVAC system up even beyond the crazy cost I'm having to pay, I knew I'd better bite that bullet. The HVAC install manager was here that Thursday afternoon to take measurements and, once he left, I found my way to the third floor so that I could take Sumner's place in the huge window facing west and soak up the warmth of that mid-February sun.

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"Million Dollar Chicken Spaghetti," from Nichole Clevenger of The Salty Marshmallow. [Published 10 October 2017 / Updated 08 September 2021]

"Big and Bubbly Focaccia," from King Arthur Baking. [Published January 2025]

Meal No. 3782: Chicken and Biscuit Dumplings

A fantastic and most generous colleague from Georgia sent me the nicest surprise gift this past week: a cookbook from the modern-day Western series Yellowstone. Its author was hired initially to provide craft service for the production of the series and ended up also becoming the on-screen ranch cook, responsible for food on and off set. The first recipe that jumped out at me, and that I tried out this past Monday evening, was chicken and biscuit dumplings. It was a hearty dish, full-flavored and nicely varied from typical chicken casseroles or pot pie. And the biscuits were themselves pretty tasty, even if I didn't do a good job of cooking them as well as I should before serving up the bowls of deliciousness. It was a fine inaugural run with this newest and very much appreciated addition to the kitchen library!

After clean-up, it was time to get in my evening stroll, which began under the rising full moon, with Mars very nearly adjacent to it. My iPhone, when wielded by my inexpert hands, never quite captures how lovely a cityscape shot like this really is, but I'm posting it anyway.

When I'd gotten in my couple of miles, I did go straight to the Tylenol bottle. I'd spent the afternoon getting the driveway cleared out from our recent snow event, and this old man was definitely feeling it all over his body.

How I felt at day's end was at huge variance from how the day started: with Sumner splayed on my lap with a Prokofiev recommendation from my buddy Kelly, playing on the laptop via Youtube.

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"Rancher's Chicken and Biscuit Dumplings" (p. 82-85) and "This Is How You Make a F*$%ing Biscuit" (p. 103). From Yellowstone: The Official Dutton Ranch Family Cookbook, by Gabriel "Gator" Guilbeau with Kim Laidlaw. San Rafael: Insight Editions, 2023.

Meal No. 3756: Beef Chili

Last Friday night, as we underwent another day of bitter cold for so early in December, the call for chili was easily made, especially since I had a portion sealed and frozen and ready to drop into the sous vide immersion circulator to make short work of it.

With our temps in the low 20s and a wind chill taking it well down into the teens, we were limited in our run-around time outside. Reckon that's what's called family time.

Minor Repairs to the Massive Beer Cooler

A former version of me was quite fond of brown ale, especially Bell’s Best Brown Ale, a seasonal offering that I would stock up on each fall to keep me well-supplied for the coming year. When the attic was rehabbed into a grand entertainment space, it included Ray’s the Bar and a double back bar commercial beer cooler (that I still cannot believe the general contractor for that project was able to get upstairs).

Then came my hardcore lifestyle shift and great weight loss, and although I still love a good cold beer of a certain sort, I hardly ever drink. I’d rather get my calories from desserts and bread. And cinnamon rolls. Definitely cinnamon rolls.

After 10 years of mostly problem-free operation, that giant cooler lost a blade on its circulation fan, and I had to call in Quality Refrigeration Concepts to determine what’s needed for a repair job. That occurred on November 19th, my one day off work that week.

Alas, the QRC tech did not inspire me with confidence, referring to Beverage-Air as an uncommon manufacturer (it’s an industry leader and actually headquartered here in Winston-Salem), and then he said the fan and motor would both have to be replaced. The trip charge was $250 and his quote for repair approached $1,000.

Then when he didn’t show up for the following Monday’s 9 a.m. scheduled return, I got a late call that he had a doctor’s appointment, apparently. When we reached the noon hour, I canceled QRC and ordered a $26 fan blade online. That’s what I should have done to begin with but my instinct is to distrust myself with equipment like that.

This tinkering also led me to recognize a neglected element of equipment maintenance, which was soon rectified thanks to the second floor vacuum cleaner and its hose and attachments.

When my hot water heater was recently replaced, I mused and muttered about an emerging worry that modern service is about upselling and maximizing profits over, well, service. I think QRC was eager to take advantage of the situation, and it was disappointing. They did not convey a sense of being an honest or trustworthy business, nor dependable as I found when they pretty much blew off our scheduled appointment.

But hey: I’m glad to discover that QRC is not a good company because I’d also thought I might reach out to them about my HVAC system. No way in hell I’d do that now!

The Rest of Thanksgiving Weekend

The quiet of an emptied homestead after a full house of guests for Thanksgiving week was almost unnerving, even while I eased myself into the restful space created by the Black Friday departures.

Sumner and Scarlett may not know how to have so much time with just us hanging together, but we found our way.

Cleaning and chores and laundry and organizing took their places on my freed agenda but there also had to be quality time with the pooches who’d suddenly lost so many sources of entertainment and interaction. That day passed uneventfully save for the brutal downtown tug battle when I took both pooches out for an afternoon stroll.

They play so much and so well at home (and poop dutifully and conveniently in the designated areas of the yard) that leaving the property for exercise (or excretion) is rare. I was out of practice and out of shape and they were nearly out of control, initially. Then we found our rhythm and it was chilly but pleasant at least when the sun poked through.

Saturday dawned bright and frigid, with a temperature we hadn’t had since last January, or so said the weatherman breathlessly. We had good reason to stay tucked in, mostly, but with stilled breezes and doses of sunshine, our outside treks for pooch priorities were not as inhospitable as the thermometer might have warned.

Trapped as I was in the early hours of the day by a slightly gassy Sumner splayed on my lap while the second cup of coffee was nursed, I turned to my typical amusements, like writing this too-long blog post. But now you know how began November’s final day at the Roediger House.

Sumner must've decided he liked the idea of taking full advantage of those long stretches on my lap because that was the story he wrote for me most of the rest of the day. I’m not used to being that sedentary but he is so very sweet and seemed to need all that closeness. Scarlett is much less demanding and considerably less affectionate. Our biggest break was for our respective suppers, when I had the oversized plate of Thanksgiving leftovers:

...and I sat with them while they tackled their evening bowls of food.

Sunday dawned a nudge colder, still below freezing, with skies that were not quite clear. In keeping with custom, those pooches slept in a while and I did not rouse them until about 8:30 am. And up they popped, happy and delighted and full of energy and good spirit...and in no way stilled or stalled by the early brush with winterlike temps lying so heavily on the week's forecast.

They do play well but sometimes they play rough, and now Sumner has a dew claw to nurse for a day or so:

And since that outside time is precious to them, even if I’m not fond of the late afternoon cloud cover when it’s in the 40s, at least it incentivized the very necessary Phase Two leaf raking.

Warm though it made me to engage in those outdoor autumn labors, I planned in advance to have the comfort of my grandmother’s incredible quilt to get through the continuing chill that’s accompanied the conclusion of this cherished holiday.