Happy Holidaze!

This time of year time seems fly by and fills all my hours. We have been having a great time but did not take the time to put it into words. About ten days ago we used some of the wife's hotel points and did a run away weekend to the Marriott Courtyard in San Francisco. We love this south of market hotel because it has an indoor pool and hot tub in addition to all the other amenities. To make it even more fun the hotel decided to upgraded us to a king with a hot tub in our very own room! I would include the normal pictures to go with the blog but the wife insisted on a no photo zone. We hit the tub and swam and had a jolly good time. We broke the normal frugal dining rule and had meals in the hotel. They have a limited cafe menu for dinner. Splitting a Caesar salad and a pizza kept the bill on the low but provided lots of food. The breakfast buffet was outstanding but topped twenty dollars per person.

Last weekend we kept to the old homestead to prepare for the holidays. I made a pot of Rancho Gordo Pinto beans, butternut squash soup and chili for later use. Years ago we used Carroll Shelby's chili mix and I had not seen it on the shelves in a while. It is really just a spice mix that you could create yourself but is convenient and makes a darn good bowl of chili. Happy holidays to all.


Butternut squash soup garnished with leftover french onion dip