a day in the life of a saturday seattle snowstorm

8 am: Wake up to meet Bethany by 9. Because of snow, take #48, which for once in its life is blessedly on time, to Judkins Park. Walk up Massachusetts, wind up park and hill to 31st in Mt. Baker, plowing through snow uphill. Going uphill in the snow is excellent exercise, by the way.

9 am: Wake up the girls at the Mt. Baker house, which has the most beautiful views of the city, ever. Also fall in love with the wood paneling in the dining room. Trust me, you need to see it. It's the stuff that people used to craft 100 years ago. It's gorgeous. Have tea with the Mt. Baker house girls, who are all lovely. Dream about making Beecher's Homemade Mac n' Cheese.

11 am: Tromp over to see Liv at Sweet and Savory, which is entirely worthy of its review in November's Seattle magazine, and in Viv's blog. It's lovely in decor and smells, and I want to stay for a long while. But it's going to snow. Bethany drops me off at the corner of Madison and 23rd, and I run into the Safeway - well, actually, I don't run, I walk. Carefully, on the ice - to find people thinking the apocolypse is coming and they need to buy 800 lbs. of everything they might possibly need in the coming snowy days. I get some Beecher's Cheddar, and Gruyere, which might be my favorite cheese in the world at the moment.

2 p.m. Make Beecher's Mac n Cheese. 1/2 the recipe, because let's be honest, I don't need a whole pan.

3 p.m. Start making bread and put it to rise. Make some broccoli, since I want to eat something green with my mac n' cheese. Eat broccoli, mac n' cheese, and sigh happily.

4 p.m. Liv calls and says she might ski over. But it's started snowing now, and it will be dark. We nix the idea.

4:30 pm. Brush butter on top of bread before about to put in oven and watch it deflate a little. Very sad. Must let it rise a bit more. It does so.

6 pm. Take bread out of the over. Marvel at how beautifully it turned out after all. Thankful.

7 pm. Make a batch of lemon drop cookies and a batch of the best brownies in the world. I freeze them. Also freeze 1/2 the bread, since Dri left already for Christmas and there is no one else to eat it.

8 pm. Laugh at Will Ferrell in Elf, on CBS, which is the only station coming in with my little rabbit ears.

10 pm. Laugh at Must Love Dogs. John Cusack essentially reprises Lloyd Dobler here, but it's oh so sweet and also funny. The zingy one-liners are enough to send me happily off to sleep with only one glance outside at the falling snow. It's been a while since there's been a good romantic comedy out. I wouldn't say MLD is Grant/Hepburn/Tracy worthy, but it's a notch above the recent idiocies.