Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Good Christmas Eats

Christmas isn't festive unless you eat some dang good food. Here I am with some North Carolina sourwood honey (dang good) and two goat cheese logs (even dang gooder). I got the goat cheese at the Raleigh Farmers Market where I get my eggs (In the Red Farm). One was rosemary garlic, the other was peppercorn. Best cheese with crackers you'll ever eat, hands down!

My other feat was making a tiramisu for Taliatha's birthday (okay, she ended up helping me since she wanted to do it together, but I will still take the credit). We used mascarpone cheese instead of vanilla pudding like some recipes call for and it was well worth the $4. We substituted Pero for the coffee. SO GOOD--and I'm not even a great cook. You can probably tell that we finally got a digital camera. (Holmeses tend to lag on adoption of new technology. We didn't have a touch tone phone until I was in 10th grade--that's 1994. I think we were the last family in Provo to make the switch to color television.) Anyway, it looks like Mallory enjoyed all of the Christmas eats too! What were your favorite Christmas eats?

Monday, December 10, 2007

Mitt Romney's "Faith in America" Speech

Last Thursday Chenae and I had a chance to attend Mitt Romney’s speech, “Faith in America”, at the George Bush Library in College Station, TX. We felt extremely lucky to be able to get tickets to the speech since the auditorium at the Bush Library only seats about 300 people. We got great seats, 5th row right in the middle.

It was interesting to watch the media circus around the event. We even got to see the one lone anti-mormon protestor almost get in a fight with a FOX camera man for trying to stick his sign behind a reporter during a live report. Both before and after the speech we got to talk to a number of “important” individuals such as Glen Beck, Dr. Richard Land (a Southern Baptist Convention big whig), a number of invited pastors, Carl Cameron (Fox News political correspondent), Jonathan Martin (Politico.com blogger), and Spencer Zwick (Romney’s National Finance Manager). Everyone was very friendly and willing to talk about their reaction to the speech.

We talked to Spencer Zwick before the speech and asked him if he had read it already. He told us that he had and that he thought it was going to go over very well. He also told us that usually before a big speech or debate that Romney gets a little anxious, but that we was surprisingly relaxed as they flew down to Texas. Spencer asked him how he could be so laid back on the eve of such an important event and Romney told him that although he didn’t know if giving this speech would be good or bad politically but that he felt personally that it was the right thing to do. He said that once the decision was made to give the speech he had felt very peaceful regardless of the outcome.

I thoroughly enjoyed the speech itself. First off, it was a historical moment, regardless of political outcomes, and I’m really grateful to have had the opportunity to be there. Although Romney is not a pound on the pulpit, emotional speaker, which at times leads some to label him as plastic, he’s a very powerful speaker in person. His delivery was articulate, passionate and sincere. I loved the focus on the religious heritage of our country and quotes from Samuel Adams, John Adams, and Abraham Lincoln. It’s a moving speech that combines and unifies a variety of important themes pertaining to religion, freedom, and politics. I know there are those that take issue with Romney on a variety of issues but I came away from last Thursday’s speech with a strong impression that Romney would make a great president if given the opportunity.

Thursday, December 6, 2007

Mr. Sub Commercial

This great commercial was brought to my attention by Kirk.