Dragon

Normal, love the idea of alternating years. I too have a huge Christmas collection (well huge for the amount of space I live in).

matthew

Depends Baldur... Have you, or have you been mooned this year???

Baldur

Often, but that happened regularly last year too.
Are you feeling any better matthew?

matthew

I am... Thank you...

Baldur

It was my pagan remedy that fixed you up

Robindcr8l

Dragon, loved the pic of Christmas house! I really enjoy these over-the-top houses. They make me laugh right out loud! They are so ridiculous, but in a very positive way. You just know that the people who put the time and energy in them really LOVE the Christmas holidays and how exciting their lights are to others!

Last year I moved to a new and bigger house in November. I was sort of coerced into hostessing a holiday party to show off my new crib. I wasn't comfortable with people turning it into a housewarming party where they may have felt obligated to bring gifts, so I created my own theme. My new house has two living room areas, one upstairs and one down. I bought a cheap, ugly, Charlie Brown fake Christmas tree for the upstairs room and asked every guest to bring the ugliest ornament they could find for the tree. The ornaments could be homemade, used, new, WHATEVER! I think you would all be surprised at how many seriously UGLY ornaments are available out there. It was a contest, and as a grand prize, the winner received a used stuffed moosehead that someone had given me years ago. It was battery operated and sang Christmas songs with life-like movement of his lips. Almost as hideous as the winning ornament. The winner was my friend Vicki, who is quite wealthy and just a little uppity only because she's smarter than 95% of the rest of the adults in the world and relishes that. She made the ornament she gave me. Apparently her in-laws make these campfirestarters out of egg cartons, melted was, and a variety of flammable things like dryer lint and sawdust. They melt the wax to hold the crap in each egg hole, then cut the eggholes apart. Very strange, but VERY ugly! She took one of these wax/lint filled eggholes and attached a ribbon to it with an ornament hook. It looks like something a cat would cough up, I swear!

I wonder where she hangs the mooshead in her mansion? LOL

Robindcr8l

And Marius, your story about Frank, the Halloween decorator, made me wish that Baldur lived nearby. He would surely be over there today hauling out coffins and gravestones just to continue Frank's legacy and delight all who know and appreciate him! Poor Frank!

marius

Baldur, I want a pagan remedy too! (Yeah, we're like a pack of kids, you give something to one and we all have to have it.)

Baldur

Here is the remedy I gave matthew days and days ago

Bundle up warmly in a sweatsuit preferably under warm blankets and drink a very hot mug of tea spiked with a shot of whiskey or rum. Whichever you prefer. You can sweeten the tea or not as you like but it should be very warm. If the alcohol cools it down too much put the mug in the microwave oven for 30-45 seconds.
You should get very drowsy and sweat profusely.
Nap for a few hours and you'll wake up soaking wet but otherwise feeling much better.
That should knock it out of your system.

marius

Robin, you are warm-hearted for sure! Spouse is of the Baldur-mind (twenty points) when it comes to helping neighbors and folks. So he brought up the idea of decorating for Frank, however we got stuck on the issue of Frank's two gigantic male children that live in that home. They are not people one wants to be around. Can't say they are scary, but they are something.

When we moved in five yrs ago, the driveway side of Frank's house was full of rather large holes. Didn't take the starlings and house sparrows long to move in. Another neighbor explained it was Frank's hockey playing kids who'd made those holes with hockey pucks. No one understands what the situation is, but the kids do not help with anything, ever!

Not long after Frank's stroke, he was out in the yard trying to mow ... with crutches! Where were the kids? Later that day the 76 year old neighbor was mowing for Frank.

At any rate, there are many signs that Frank is moving. The bird homes have been re-sided, the unkempt back yard cleaned out a bit. You'd think we'd know more but except for four neighbors, the rest stay to themselves.

Even Frank was never sociable. The only way we ever met or talked with him was the first Halloween we were here. Marius saw Frank's Halloween splendor and said to spouse, "You know those wooden tombstones John has stacked in the barn?" Spouse was on it. Next thing we knew Frank had purchased all 40 of the tombstones at a price he liked.

Anyway, love your ugly Christmas ornament idea. Believe I have seen those egg carton things of which you spoke. Bet it IS an ugly ornament! Sounds like it was a fun party.

marius

Ah Baldur, forgot to say I'm not sick. However, can count self in for having received remedy. Thank you!

marius

Baldur, also many thanks for roomba cat videos! Now want a roomba just for the cats!

Dragon

marius, sad that the neighbour in his 70's will volunteer to mow for poor Frank before his own kids. We have a client who's in her 80's and is the sweetest lady you ever met. Her Grandkids used to do the yardwork for her but they've moved away. She asked the teens next door if they'd be interested in doing a little mowing and what not for her and she'd pay them. They responded by scoffing and saying 'We won't even mow our own Grandma's yard'
If my parents heard any of us say that you can bet we'd have been over there the next day mowing for free AND doing our own yard. At least they could have politely said No thank you.

Baldur

Now here is an odd request..
It follows back to talking about the church I attended as a child....
Do any of you in your real or electronic clip art files have and good images of stars as painted as a decorative motif in the medieval period of Europe?
I'm thinking along the lines of stars painted on church ceilings or as a decoration on a precious object, maybe a chest, a jewel box perhaps on a piece of jewelry.
Baldur just spent a great deal of time looking at images on Google and through some of his art books.
Ideally the images would be pre-Renaissance art.
Baldur is tyrying to design his next piece of needlepoint.
Any ideas on where I could find something like this online would also be appreciated.

Baldur

What I've Googled so far has been
Medieval star
Renaissance star (though that's later than I'd prefer
Church ceiling stars
Medieval nativity

Of these choices adding 'nativity' to the search words brought me closets to what I'm thinking of.

sheftali52

Oh my, Sheftali apologizes for not keeping up with the great material on Channel Baldur. So much has amused, interested, and enchanted me--from Professor Elemental rap/hip hop to marius' geese music to the myth of clean underwear to Baldur's china for 50 and sterling for 48 to marius' neat spouse to No-el to roomba cats to Christmas light extravaganzas. What a great forum this is!!! I have to tell you, though, Sheftali was rolling on the floor (and still is, come to think of it) when Baldur described his WOOFing at the nice old Scottish man. The mind picture of that happening was just TOO funny, and rates as one of my favorites. As for the Christmas lights on houses, I saw the funniest photo in an email recently--on the left was a house with every square inch of house and yard lit up with every imaginable kind of Christmas lights/decorations. On the right side of this photo was another house with the word "ditto" outlined in lights on its roof, and a lighted arrow pointing to the lit up house next door! Now that is funny! Sheftali does not comment as often as others, but trust me, she enjoys the stories here on Channel Baldur and follows them very faithfully.

Qsilv

Baldur - re stars - check the chapel in the old Tudor section of Hampton Court. ;>

Normal

Baldur, I always am certain I'll remember which it is, but never do. Often end up looking at some photo from last year and then doing whichever it wasn't (solar or lunar, I mean). I vaguely recall it's solar in even-numbered years, perhaps.

Baldur

Qsilv, thank you. Baldur hasn't found what he's looking for yet but is having a great time looking at gazillions of images from Hampton Court.
I don't think I've made it as far as the chapel yet, got waylaid by the kitchens.

Baldur thinks Christmas should always be 'lunar', in my memories it's always dark outside.

Baldur

This is an exciting day at Chez Baldur, Robert took a stack of CDs that had been skipping and ran them through a CD buffing machine that is supposed to clear the bad spots off the surface.
Wasn't one of the touted benefits of CDs versus LPs the fact that the new media doesn't get scratched and start skipping?
I guess I'm being silly. Along the same lines when cable tv was first introduced one of the major benefits was that it was commercial free.
Does anyone remember those days?
Does anyone recall when MTV was 'round the clock' music?

Anyway Baldur has loaded the cd player with disks he hasn't listened to in ages. Right now Pink Floyd's double album 'pulse' is playing, basically a greatest hits live collection.
So far no problems on these
After this I've got the greatest hits of 'Culture Club' and a live 'Eagles' double album.
This is great to put these back onto the playlist.