- Make a shopping list of all the necessary items for a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
- Go grocery shopping so that I can purchese all the necessary items and get a head start on the preparations for a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
- Dig out and then iron the table linens so that I have a worthy place to serve a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal.
- Find a loving new home for the two dogs and two cats that have turned nocturnal. FYI, we have not joined them in this new lifestyle.
- Fluffed the girls’ beds and swept their rooms so that, when they come home this week, home will have that special kind of feeling.
- Cleaned the rest of the house to insure that home would indeed have that special kind of feeling.
- Started writing my final exams so that I can spend next weekend Christmas shopping with everyone else on the face of the earth.
- Made a Christmas gift list so that if I had written my final exams and was going shopping next weekend I would know what gifts I was going to buy.
- Slept all day because I was awake most of the night as a result of the newly nocturnal animals that did not find a new home today and that did not sleep last night.
I didn’t do any of these things. Today was the first day in many days, weeks, maybe even months that we have not had something that we had to do. It was a strange feeling not to have to set the alarm at all. It was odd to read the paper over morning coffee rather than evening tea.
While reading the paper, I saw an ad for something called ICE at the Gaylord Texan Resort. ICE is a display of carved ice sculptures that, this year, depicts scenes from “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” Going to see that sounded like fun. We logged on to the website and sorted out details like times, admission cost, etc. Decision made. That’s what we were going to do today. In fact, we decided to have an entire “date day.”
Before beginning our day of frivolous teen-aged behavior, we did accomplish one thing on the To-Do List; we went to Lowes and bought bathroom faucets and transition pieces to compliment the eighty boxes of hardwood flooring that are sitting in the middle of the den floor acclimating to their new environment before being laid in their permanent position. After that brief moment of responsible adult behavior, we were off for a day of fun.We had lunch at our favorite pizza place – chicken and spinach pizza with bacon, tomatoes, and lots of cheese. I suspect that this may be the absolute best pizza on the planet! Once we devoured almost the entire pizza, we headed to the Gaylord Texan Resort to see ICE.
We purchased our tickets. (Here the cashier asked us politely if we were eligible for the senior discount. We gave an honest response of “not quite yet, but thanks for asking.” The show begins with a short video explaining the process of creating all of these scenes from ice. It included statistics such as how many tons of ice, what temperatures are necessary, how much refrigeration and how many people it takes to create and maintain these amazing ice sculptures. The whole concept of ICE was inspired by huge ice sculptures that are created each winter in the northern part of China. In fact, it is the skills of a group of Chinese artists that are flown to Texas and spend many hours carving these magnificent ice sculptures of Charles Schultz’s iconic characters.
After the video, everyone is given a parka to wear into the 12 degree area where the Peanuts Gang is waiting. The sights were pretty amazing!
The Peanuts Gang
A familiar image of poor Charlie Brown
And the classic image of Lucy. 
Shroder
Pigpen singing his heart out.
Sally
Linus and his blanket
The beloved beagle Snoopy and a happy endingNot quite ready for our date to be over, we decided to stop for dessert and coffee. To double the pleasure, we opted to have this nightcap at Barnes and Noble. Caffeine, sweets, and books! Life doesn’t get much better than when these three elements converge.
And what better way to bring a wonderful date day to close than by . . . .writing a blog post.
