It's the most wonderful time of the year.

I'm a extra 50% off queen, a connoisseur of clearance racks, a rabid half price enthusiast. I enjoy after Christmas shopping almost as much as Christmas shopping itself. I love hunting down a bargain, especially if it is an additional 40% off the clearance price. This is the time of year when I purchase ornaments, wrapping paper, bows, Christmas lights and holiday shirts for next year. Next Christmas I'll open my storage boxes and surprise myself with everything I purchased and then put away this year.

The after Christmas sales are only matched by the January and September end of season sales. In January, jackets, sweaters and pants are drastically reduced despite the cold weather. Last year, on one of the coldest nights on record in LA, I walked into a Target and purchased leather gloves with Thinsulate for the clearance price of $2. Bikinis were full price. In September, I bought shorts off the clearance rack as temperatures soared. Jackets were full price. Who can explain such wonders.

You Can't Judge A Book By It's Cover

You can't judge a book by it's title either. I'm an avid reader of non-fiction history and, with the exception of a few authors like Alison Weir, I pick my books based on the cover and the title. As a result, I have a 50-50 chance of reading something really good or reading a boring doctoral thesis marketed as a juicy read.

Examples:

Sex with Kings by Elanor Herman - A great book and exactly what the title implies. History told in a gossipy style with an entertaining tone and a quick pace. I'm currently reading the companion book Sex with the Queen.

The Death of Kings; Royal Deaths in Medieval England by Michale Evan, MD - Promising title, boring book. Considering the number of Medieval English kings who met really interesting ends (do we really believe William II died in a hunting "accident"?) this book could have been quite a read. However, it turned out to be a thesis disguised by a snappy title and dry as toast.

The Story of England by Christopher Hibbert - Sounds dry but the book presents facts in a lively way and is very accessible for any non-history buff who needs a quick overview of British history. My husband read it before our trip to England and he really enjoyed it. The books treats kings the way In Touch treats celebrities and isn't afraid to tell you why Edward II was introduced to the wrong end of a red hot poker.

How to Do It: Guides to Good Living for Renaissance Italians by Rudolph M. Bell - A wee bit dry for such an interesting title. Not as dry as The Death of Kings but not as exciting or lively as Sex with Kings.

A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812 by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich - The title sounds dry but the book is great. A good mix of facts and scholarly work about birth, marriage and sex in Colonial America.

If anyone has any suggestions for great history books or titles to avoid, please let me know.

It's begining to look a lot like goody baskets.

'Tis the season when my office is flooded with baskets full of cheeses that don't need to be refrigerated, gourmet chocolates we've never heard of and tea biscuits. You can practically hear the stampede when everyone receives the email announcing a basket has arrived and is ready for perusing.

It's also the time of year to eat the things you don't eat the rest of the year. For me, the once a year treats include eggnog, port wine cheese balls and those round cookies coated with powdered sugar ( pictured above). My husband likes Ferrero Rocher, Hickory Farms beef sticks and something called Chutter. We are currently hunting down said Chutter which teases us by appearing in Google searches only to disappear when we click on the page. Rumor has it that Hickory Farms doesn't make it anymore.

Like the goody basket, these treats have become as synonymous with the season as Santa, candy canes and Christmas lights. It's why I can't buy Christmas tree Peeps. Peeps mean Easter and you can't simply cross holiday treats like that.

The ghost of Christmas past.

I love old movies, especially old Christmas movies like "A Christmas in Connecticut." However, I have never been a fan of "It's A Wonderful Life". It all goes back to Christmas 1989. I was a sophomore in high school and everyone, including my parents, my aunt, my sister and most of my friends, had a nasty cold.

Everyone, except me.

It was like having Christmas in a pest house. Everyone was sick and anyone who wasn't refused to come over to celebrate.

After a sniffling round of opening presents, everyone went back to bed and I spent Christmas watching TV. "It's a Wonderful Life" was on all day on almost every channel. I watched the movie and wondered afterwards what I was missing. I have to admit I also feel that way about "A Christmas Story" but that is another blog entry. It wasn't a high school girl's disregard for the past that caused my dislike. I'd been an avid old movie fan since childhood thanks to the Tom Hatten Saturday Afternoon Movie show on channel 5.

Perhaps one of these days, when the memory of the most boring Christmas ever is finally a very, very, very dim one, I will try watching it again. In the meantime, I think I'll enjoy a little "Charlie Brown Christmas" and "Miracle on 34th Street".


Feel free to agree or disagree.

What's in your wardrobe?

Unlike the following people, there is nothing of real value or interest in my wardrobe, my attic or the crawl space beneath my house. It's one of the downsides to living in Southern California; there isn't enough history to allow the average person to find items of significant historical interest beneath the floorboards. The only claim to fame my house has is that the drummer of a well-known 1980's hair band that shall not be named once lived here. Every once in a while we receive some of his mail but I'd rather have one of the following:



a painting by Caravaggio,
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=411248&in_page_id=1811

a sketch by Michelangelo,
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8TC63CG0&show_article=1

or a first edition book by Chaucer.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=441046&in_page_id=1770

Enjoy a little Restoration this holiday season.

What will you serve for Christmas dinner? Ham? Turkey? Roast beef? Why not really impress the family and whip up a traditional Restoration dish? Imagine the kids' faces when you bring to the table a nice marinated conger eel garnished with ellicksander. Your children will beg you for broccoli.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=426774&in_page_id=1770

During this busy season, don't forget to take time out for yourself. Why not curl up with a cup of cocoa and a good book? Perhaps Samuel Pepys' confessional diary? It's stuffed full of stories about his affairs, the great fire of London and plague-pits.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=477584&in_page_id=1879

Or how about something from the lesser known Roger Morrice? Bishops in the bawdy house! An Italian eunuch performing at Whitehall!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=473320&in_page_id=1770

I love interesting history.

How will they remember us?

My husband and I enjoyed high tea at the Pump Room in Bath on Thanksgiving. It was a treat to sit in the historic room listening to the pianist playing Handel while paintings of lords and ladies watched us eat scones with clotted cream. High tea is a great British tradition and in fact, historians have connected the decline in health of the British poor to low calorie, low nutrient tea replacing high calorie, high nutrient beer as their drink of choice. But I digress.

In America we tend to romanticize high tea because it isn’t a part of our culture and because of its historical connotations and innate pinkie raising elegance. My mother belongs to a Victorian group that dresses up and meets for tea. Even one of her social clubs with no Victorian connection is meeting for high tea and encouraging members to wear Victorian dress. Teahouses and hotels all over America offer high tea in elegant and not so elegant settings.

What I wonder is when the next drink fad finally replaces coffee and time has made us forget that there is a Starbucks on every corner (remember when 7-11 held that distinction?) will future generations romanticize coffeehouses the way we romanticize high tea? Will future entrepreneurs open coffeehouses decorated with old couches, glass jars full of biscotti and vintage Starbucks signs? Will the strains of Nirvana and other mope rock classics play in the background while people have a lark dressing in flannel and drinking whipped coffees? Will my grandchildren torture me with questions about hanging out in coffeehouses during open mic night while I shake my head in disbelief and feel very, very old? May I live so long.