Coming To Your Christmas

JWise Photo of the Day

Caleb and Jessica Aldridge, Caroline Wise and John Wise in Phoenix, Arizona

If we were to celebrate this annual American ritual of Christmas, this would be the image that would have accompanied our Christmas cards. On the left are Caleb and Jessica Aldridge, our son-in-law and daughter/stepdaughter, who were returning to California from a two-week cross-country road trip that took them over to Florida. Due to circumstances related to Caleb’s naval service and being stationed abroad combined with the natural forces of life that take people here and there, we’d not seen him in about ten years, and while they were only able to spend a few hours with us, it was a great reunion, and we hope it won’t require another ten years before the four of us get together again. The funny thing is, this photo almost didn’t happen as we were all so happy to see each other and talk about their big adventure that I forgot to take a photo of the happy, possibly weird, and maybe a bit dysfunctional family. Caroline and I ran back downstairs after them to pull them from their car as they were heading out and insisted on showing the world our happiness.

First Gingerbread House

JWise Photo of the Day

Caroline Wise decorated her first gingerbread house

Go ahead, Caroline, overthink things, build up a bunch of stress, and convince yourself that this was a bad decision, but then finally accept that you committed to something and get on with it. And so it was with the first ever gingerbread house my wife decorated. What compelled her to do such a thing? A competition at work to celebrate Christmas cheer. Aside from minor engineering issues surrounding the effectiveness of using icing to glue the walls together, she ultimately had fun and was proud of her creation. And although she didn’t win, I believe she looks forward to potentially decorating another gingerbread house in the future. [I did get compliments for the roof because I added frosted shredded wheat cereal pieces – Caroline]

Big Sur Eucalyptus Soap

JWise Photo of the Day

Big Sur Eucalyptus Soap

It’s likely somewhere around 20 years now that we’ve been using Big Sur Soap and specifically: its eucalyptus scent. We’ve tried other fragrances from them, but this one is a great reminder of all our moments driving along the Pacific Coast on Highway 1, admiring the towering eucalyptus trees, and basking in their beautiful aroma, ensuring that they are never far. Sheila Hillman, the proprietor of this brand, can’t always predict the popularity of the various scents in her repertoire, and it has often happened that while in the Big Sur area, the shops we relied on were out of eucalyptus, and we’ve come rely on ordering directly from Sheila. Even then, it’s not uncommon that she’s sold out until the next batches are done, so this time, I put in an early order for ten bars. Upon their arrival, I stored them in vacuum-sealed bags to prevent further curing and evaporation. Depending on how well this works, I might buy another ten bars to ensure we have the wonderful scent of the Central California Coast for many years to come.

Christmas Cookies, Cat Butt Style

JWise Photo of the Day

Christmas Cookies, Cat Butt Style

It’s just after Thanksgiving, and considering we chose not to travel this fall, what was left to do but make Christmas cookies, cat-butt style! Obviously, we do not care if Santa leaves us a lump of coal after he sees that we signaled him to stare at a cat butthole and sip some almond milk because we’re holding out for a visit from his transgressive wife Mrs. Claus who turned bad over the last years.

Thanksgiving in a Box

JWise Photo of the Day

Thanksgiving in a box

Less than two weeks ago, the four-month intensity that included planning, the actual vacation, and the subsequent 60 days of writing created a situation where I was not ready to jump back into traveling. This is only the third or fourth time in the past nearly 25 years that we’ve been in Phoenix for Thanksgiving, and in celebration of that, we spared no expense and went all out. Yep, we skipped the Chinese restaurant and made dinner at home after buying a box of gravy, a box of stuffing, and a tub of cranberry sauce from Costco, rounding it out with a vegan Field Roast from Whole Foods.

As for fresh food? We passed on that because that’s just too much work when trying to capture laziness, which we did perfectly. Was the dinner ideal? On one hand, of course, it was, as it appealed to our sense of doing as little as possible, and like the year we tried Tofurkey or the Cajun Turducken, it was something out of the ordinary.

Also out of the ordinary, by foregoing our almost ritualistic Thanksgiving visits to the Oregon coast, we’ll have ended up not visiting the Pacific Ocean even once during 2023, the first time since 1995 that we didn’t gaze upon that vast body of blue-green water at least once over the course of a year. Noting this, I’m opening my 2024 travel itinerary and penciling in a reminder to visit the western coast of the U.S. next year.

Partial Eclipse

JWise Photo of the Day

Partial eclipse of the sun in Phoenix, Arizona

From out of the shadows of writing non-stop about our extended vacation to Europe this summer, I took a minute to step outside for this partial eclipse of the sun. I was able to use a corner of an old CD to focus on the sun in order to capture this image, and while the thousands of crescents cast upon the ground by the light that fell through the trees, it was this photo that made the grade for sharing.

Regarding the gap that exists between returning to the U.S. and this post of the eclipse: following our return, I have been working non-stop capturing the details of our extensive and immersive vacation. My life exists between a coffee shop and making meals at home; there is nothing else but my singular focus to wrap what would end up being more than 84,000 words to about 1,000 photos to hopefully best exemplify our adventure.