Weather ~ Shrimp Mac 'n' Cheese ~ Tournament of Roses Parade ~ Frank Mize ~ Rose Parade Memories ~ New Years Day ~ National Hangover Day ~ Bloody Mary Day

  

Good 35º super foggy here morning. 

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! WOW, 2023.

 

Yesterday afternoon we had some fluffy clouds and blue sky and we topped at 51º.....

 

From Mr. Food

 

 

Our Shrimp Mac 'n' Cheese is a seaside version of that classic comfort dish. The shrimp gives it an added flavor of summer, but this creamy, dreamy mac and cheese recipe is perfect all year round. One bite, and we know this is going to be your new favorite. It's an all new mac and cheese dinner sensation that you'll want again and again. 

When it comes to comfort food, you can't beat a good seafood mac and cheese recipe. This is one delivers! Using both cheddar and mozzarella, tasty shrimp, and a buttery cracker topping, you will be in heaven as soon as you start eating. To learn how to make this shrimp mac, simply watch the video and follow along with the easy directions below.

 

• 1 pound pasta shells
• 6 tablespoons butter, divided
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon seafood seasoning
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 cups milk
• 3 cups shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
• 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1/2 cup coarsely crushed butter crackers
• 1 pound cooked and peeled medium-sized shrimp

 

1. Preheat oven to 375º. Coat a 9 x 13-inch baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Cook pasta according to package directions; drain
3. In a large soup pot, melt 4 tablespoons of butter over medium heat. Stir in flour, seafood seasoning, salt, and pepper, and cook until golden, about 1 minute. Gradually add milk, bring to a boil, and cook until thickened, stirring constantly. Stir in 3 cups cheese until melted. When sauce is smooth, remove from heat, add cooked pasta, shrimp and mozzarella cheese and stir until thoroughly combined. Pour mixture into prepared baking dish.
    
4. When sauce is smooth, remove from heat, add cooked pasta, shrimp and mozzarella cheese and stir until thoroughly combined. Pour mixture into prepared baking dish.
5. 1. In a small bowl, combine crushed butter crackers with remaining 2 tablespoons of melted butter; sprinkle on top of the casserole. Bake 20-30 minutes, or until heated through and the top is golden. Serve.

 

 

 

The Tournament of Roses Parade, typically shortened to Rose Parade, is a parade held annually on the morning (8:00 am Pacific Time) of New Year's Day in Pasadena, California.

It is produced by the non-profit Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association and includes flower-covered floats, marching bands, and equestrian units. The parade, whose route is mostly along Colorado Boulevard, is followed by the Rose Bowl collegiate football game in the afternoon. When New Year's Day falls on a Sunday, the parade and the Rose Bowl game are moved to the next day, Monday.

 

First produced on January 1, 1890, the Rose Parade is watched in person by hundreds of thousands of spectators on the parade route, and is broadcast on multiple television networks in the United States. It is seen by millions more on television worldwide in more than 100 international territories and countries.

 

The Rose Bowl is a college football game that was added in 1902 to help fund the cost of staging the parade.

 

Members of Pasadena's Valley Hunt Club first staged the parade in 1890. Since then the parade has been held in Pasadena every New Year's Day, except when January 1 falls on a Sunday. In that case, it is held on the subsequent Monday, January 2. This exception was instituted in 1893, as organizers did not wish to disturb horses hitched outside Sunday church services. (This event was held even during both World War years.)

 

 

The stately Italian Renaissance-style mansion (391 Orange Grove Avenue, Pasadena) of William Wrigley Jr. (the maker of Wrigley's chewing gum) was offered to the city of Pasadena after Mrs. Wrigley's death in 1958, under the condition that their home would be the Rose Parade's permanent headquarters.

Tournament House is the name given the former home where the organization is headquartered.

 

 

Special birthday today, my neighbor Frank Mize is celebrating. HAPPY BIRTHDAY FRANK!! Thanks for being a special neighbor and friend.

 

Historically this date.........

1890 – The Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California, is first held.

 

1908 – For the first time, a ball is dropped in New York City's Times Square to signify the start of the New Year at midnight.

 

1954 – NBC makes the first coast-to-coast NTSC color broadcast when it telecast the Tournament of Roses Parade

 

1962 – United States Navy Seals established.

 

1971 – Cigarette advertisements are banned on American television.

 

 

And births on this first day of the year include....

1735 – Paul Revere, American patriot (d. 1818)

 

1752 – Betsy Ross, American seamstress (d. 1836)

 

 

 

 

 

1895 – J. Edgar Hoover, American FBI director (d. 1972)

 

 

 

 

1930 – Ty Hardin, American film actor (d.2017)

 

 

 

 Wow, 8 wives!! The last one he married in 2007!

 

1935 – B. Kliban, American cartoonist (d. 1990)

 

 

 

 

   "Love to eat them mousies. Mousies what I love to eat.

    Bite they little heads off and nibble on they tiny feet."

 

1938 – Frank Langella, American actor

 

 

My Rose Parade memories....

After having marched in the Rose Parade with the LA Sheriff's Boys Band back in 1961 playing the glockenspiel,

 

and marching the 5½ miles from Orange Grove to Colorado Blvd to Sierra Madre Blvd behind the Sheriff's Mounted and walking through all that horse poo,  I then "worked" the parade as a Reserve Deputy for a number of years.

 We had to be at the command post by 3am for instructions and then we took our positions. Generally I was at the intersection of Orange Grove and Colorado (where the TV cameras were) and one year I escorted Sheriff Sherman Block to his seat in the grandstand on Orange Grove. Another year a bunch of demonstrators sat down in front of the Rose Queen's float and we had to "escort" them off the route behind the stands for questioning. My nephew was watching the parade on TV from Lake Tahoe and called my sister screaming, "Aunt Sue is on the TV!!!". Another year I worked on Sierra Madre keeping an intersection clear for emergency vehicles. A man who seemed to be 12' tall put his chair down in the wrong place. I, in my nicest way, told him he can't sit there. He stood up, my face was opposite his belt buckle (TALL MAN!) and he was acting irritated. I kept talking to him and he seemed to relax and back up. I thought I was really doing good! Then, I glanced over my shoulder and there was a Sgt and 4 deputies!! LOL. Yep, backup is the BEST! Anyway, good memories of the parade!

 

 

All I know. Nuff said. Have a Happy New Year's Day. Ciao.

xo Sue Mom Bobo

Nearly the entire world recognizes New Year’s Day on January 1st. It’s also one of the most celebrated holidays of the year.

Celebrations will begin in the Pacific Ocean with Samoa celebrating the New Year before the rest of the world. The latest stroke of midnight will occur in the middle of the Pacific Ocean near Baker Island, which is halfway between Hawaii and Australia.

HOW TO OBSERVE

Traditions around the world:

• Kiss at midnight the one person you hope to keep kissing the rest of the year.
• Making noise, either in the form of fireworks, ringing bells, horns, blasting, or pistol shots are traditional around the world.
• In Holland, they toast to the new year with spiced wine, wassail in England, or champagne in the United States.
• Resolutions are not a modern tradition. The Babylonians made commitments to return borrowed objects and to pay old debts.

 

NEW YEAR’S DAY HISTORY

The new year has been celebrated for millennia. The earliest record of new year’s celebrations occurred during Babylonian times. However, January 1st wasn’t always the designated day. For example, the first new moon after the vernal equinox ushered in the new year at one time. These festivities occurred in Martius (March), the first month in the early Roman calendar, which only had ten months.

King Pompilius later added the months Januarius (named for Janus, the pagan god of gates, doors and beginnings) and Februarius bringing the calendar to 12 months. It was Julius Caesar who created the Julian calendar, which most closely resembles the Gregorian calendar a majority of the world follows today.

Romans celebrated January 1 in honor of Janus, offering sacrifices, giving gifts, and decorating with laurel branches. With his two faces, the god Janus was able to look toward the past and forward to the future. Celebrating the first day of the year in the appropriately named month of January, Romans made sacrifices to Janus, giving gifts and general revelry.

 

It's also............

On January 1st, National Hangover Day nurses the aching heads of all of us who over celebrated New Year’s Eve each year.

Symptoms of a Hangover

• Feeling tired: Alcohol is a toxin. Our bodies metabolize toxins (alcohol) at a certain pace. When the speed of consumption exceeds the pace the liver can process it, we become intoxicated. The risk of hangover becomes substantially higher, too. As the liver breaks down alcohol, it produces the toxic chemical acetaldehyde.  One of the substances the body produces to counter these toxins is glutathione. The body can only make so much at a time, and a night of drinking quickly depletes it. Since glutathione is a stimulant, when it’s exhausted, we feel tired.
• Upset stomach:  Alcohol promotes secretion of hydrochloric acid in the stomach.  Excessive amounts of hydrochloric acid leads to a queasy stomach, diarrhea, or vomiting.
• Headache or muscle aches: Alcohol is a diuretic.  Dehydration leads to aches and pains, as well as the upset stomach listed above.

Also, today is...

 

For all those who celebrated more than they should have, National Bloody Mary Day serves up one of the world’s most popular hangover cures on January 1st.

It would seem the Bloody Mary is the product of several hard day’s nights, lackluster cocktails, and seemingly tasteless liquor.

When the Russian Revolution pressed fleeing men into Paris and to Harry’s Bar at The Ritz Hotel, bartender Ferdinand “Pete” Petiot mixed up a cocktail that eventually made its way to post-prohibition America.

According to Food and Drink in American History: “Full Course” Encyclopediaby Andrew F. Smith, the Bloody Mary made its debut in Paris at The Ritz Hotel in 1921. Originally named the Bucket of Blood, it also went by the name Red Snapper. Petiot later left Paris and introduced the vodka, tomato juice, lemon juice, Worcestershire, cayenne, and salty cocktail to the New York King Cole Bar scene when prohibition ended.

Some attribute the name to notorious Queen Mary Tudor, who executed hundreds of Protestants in the name of Catholicism during her short five-year reign from 1553 to 1558. Others claim Petiot’s girlfriend of the same name receives the credit.

Today’s Bloody Mary’s include a variety of ingredients from pickles, olives, and celery to bacon, horseradish, tobacco, and peppers.