Connoisseurs select the ultimate full English breakfast

I love a full English breakfast (or even more, a full Scottish breakfast), but if I have one, I don't have any room for lunch.

Scrambled eggs or an omelet with toast and a latte is all I really need to get started.  Anything else just takes too much time away from my morning routine. 

I also love breakfasts, and delight in cooking them; and using ingredients scrounged,and/or saved,from dinner previous,or leftovers,mixed with fresh veggies,and fresh eggs.   I also love hardboiled eggs,tomatoes,fresh bread (OK, from my machine)and mayo I make for the occasion,or herbed butter made on the spot.

And I do these in the RV,too. And use the BBQ with a griddle,for pancakes,bacon,and sausage...outdoorsey....

I have found that adding just a bit of horseradish to my scrambled eggs gives them just that right amount of kick to really wake me up.

OOOH, and mustard powder,dry mustard powder mixed with a few drops of water,allowed to set for a few minutes,and mixed in...another great thing to try.   We learned that at Poupon U., the mustard Collage in Mt Horeb(see photo)

It just depends on what I've woken up to that day. Some days I eat a very hearty breakfast that will keep me filled until supper and other days just a cup of coffee please. Eggs, grits, oatmeal, bacon (turkey usually), maybe sausage (turkey also), toast, biscuits, pancakes or pretty much anything else I'm in the mood for can be served up as breakfast. Did I mention that I think the word, "Breakfast", is so cool? It is the mean that "Breaks" the "Fast". I know...pretty corny but I always think of it when I'm trying figuring out what to have.

Having gone to bed at 5A, I awaken five minutes either side of 930A ... Brush n Flush and go in to Breakfast at 10A ... the Half Hour elapsed is just sufficient to chill the Champagne to the proper temperature(Forty-Two Degrees) in order to make a proper ewer of Mimosa

My Favorite Breakfast Treat, is three Eggs with Green Onions and Cream, scrambled dry but not burnt, about a pound and a half of Corn Beef Hash done on the Griddle, with a  generous dollop of fresh Sour Cream next to the Eggs, and a split, toasted Rye Bagel slathered with Butter, and decorated with fresh Lime Curds or Orange Marmalade, and Hot Coffee with Chicory ... The Mimosa is there to ensure a daily regimine of Vitamin-C ... and then to work by 11A

We vary the Menu around here to try and not serve the same thing day after day, but there are a few constants ... Like Grits, either boiled or fried, Hotwater Corn Bread,  French Roast Seaport Coffee, Peanut Butter(for Hotcakes, Hot Cereals, or Toast) and an assortment of SemiSweet Wines, to accompany any thing one might desire ... When in a hurry, we might just make do with a wedge of Sweet Potato Pie with some Blackstrap  Molasses drizzled on top, and a couple of good sized chunks of fire-roasted Kielbasa, or maybe a couple of split Catheads with Redbone Gravy poured all over ... Nobody goes hungry around here, and whatever it is will stick to one's ribs and power him thru a good morning's work ... What might surprise an Observer, is that none of us is fat ... a little gravitationally rearranged ergonomically, perhaps ... but there isn't a slob in the Crewe ... Bein' laid over a fender most of the time may help in that cause, and I can promise unabashedly that each of us is equipped with his own Six-Pak .......
 
Saturday mornings, we really put on the Dog, and Breakfast may last two hours or more, but then ... that is what Saturday is for ... Rest and Recreation ... Nobody works on Saturday, but everybody eats .......

When I toured the UK, I did enjoy the Full English breakfast. Banana pancakes with macadamia nuts are my current fav with Kona coffee. But a country boy always reverts from time to time to cathead biscuits opened up and smothered in sawmill bravy with sauage and blackberry jam.  And once a month or so I try to indulge in a perfect Bloody Mary for as W.C. Fields would say "I must have a drink of breakfast."
 

Memorable breakfasts are less about what I've eaten than when, where, and with whom I've eaten them.  Coming 'off the trail' when backpacking, I had a great breakfast with my brother was at Pam's Diner (the sign still says Brown's Diner) in the little town a Talhina, OK.  I really don't remember what I ate; it was good, but the waitress, the 'ambiance', the weather, and my brother's company were the critical elements.  (Oh, and being half starved, too!).  AND making a cup of instant coffee over an alchohol stove after a cold night in a tent ain't half bad either!  If it weren't for the blasted head cold I picked up over the holidays, I'd be out this weekend.....  As it is, my usual breakfast? A cup of cafe con leche made from the strongest beans I can find (usually French roast from Central Market).  After my 'mid-night snacking' (bran flakes and milk after 11 pm) I'm not very hungry in the morning......  

Olivia describes me as 'eccentric'.  I think of myself as innovative and creative.  I'll let my breakfast disclosures speak for themselves.  (Did I mention I'm a risk taker, heh, heh, heh?)

I just noticed the headline here: "Connoisseurs select the ultimate full English breakfast"... I'm trying to imagine a Frenchman (say from Salon de Provence) eating breakfast in Halesworth, Suffolk, England, and I simply can't.  The synapses don't stretch that far.....

Good  morning,  virtual  friends,  and  a  belated  happy  new  year!
 
I  love  a  traditional  English  breakfast,   it  was  all  I  ate  {not  counting  dark  roast  American  coffee  &  English  muffins}  in  London.   But  I  enjoy  traditional  breakfast  foods  for   my  main  meal,  if  I  pack  away  that  much  food  in  the  morning  I  am  too  sluggish  to  function  @  100%.   Found  a  nice  little  spot  in  Coventry,  the  cook  took  a  fancy  to  me  {It  costs  nothing  to  compliment  the  staff,  the  payback  in  extreme  quality  service}.  She  would  break  house  rules,  and  cook  breakfast  right  in  the  middle  of  evening  rush. 
Came  back  with  a  mint  Burberry's  London  double-breasted  cashmere  topcoat,  the  original  owner  so  enjoyed  the  cusine  that  he   found  that  he  was no  longer  a  size  44  long...lol.
 
So  how  have  you  rascals  managed  without  me  for  the  past  three  days?   I  expect  that  someone  will  "snitch  out"  anybody  guilty  of  aberrent  behavior,    so  those  responsible  may  as  well  confess,   and  mitigate  your  punishment.....lol

Jalopkin~Breakfast at your house sounds great.  Of course your crew isn't overweight. The secret to having a healthy body weight is eating a good breakfast. If you're full in the morning you don't need to snack on the junk during the day.
 
Michael~ I'm going to pick up some horseradish today and experiment.
 
I use Chinese  mustard with  my eggs. It wakes me up and helps to ward off the common cold.    

Getting ready to start breakfast in a little bit. This morning, I'm serving over-easy eggs, homefries, and ham. Nothing too spectacular, but everything is well-seasoned and cooked well enough to fill the body with warmth and happiness on yet aother dreary gray below freezing early January day. Besides, Sundays are the day I do the full breakfast.

Bert~Welcome back and  Happy New Year. Hope you off doing something fun.  Since you mentioned that you're a 44 long, the same size as James Bond, I'll assume that you were off saving the world.
 
I'm having leftover eggplant parmesgian for breakfast.  I woke up too late to think rationally or spell correctly.   

Good morning! Happy new year BERT!!!
 
I had a warm poptart slathered w/ butter & the rest of my cold filet mignon w/ bleu cheese butter from NY's eve. Yum- I love to graze on Saturday mornings. And my hot tea.
 
JULIA- your eggplant parmesan sounds good- I love savory things for breakfast.
 
I cook big breakfasts on Sunday afternoon when my sweetheart is home- if he is not I graze.

Roadyacht & Jalopkin---you sound like my kind of people!!  I could do a 2 hr breakfast--except, my husband eats way too fast!  And I will find most anything in the frig to re-purpose for morning eating.  And eggs?  Anytime, anyday, any way.........love those little jewels.  I am just beginning to like oatmeal.  Cold cereal has never done anything for me. On this morning that is only at 3 degrees all of those breakfasts sound wonderful.

Breakfast in not in my vocabulary unles someone else is cooking it.
 
I can't even make the dark roast in the AM. That's why when I finish the pot I make tomorrow's.
 
Food comes later in the day for me.
 
Breakfeast came be dinner at my place.
 
Eggs over easy, hash browns and sausage from NC that a friend of a friend brings us.

While in GB with my English friend we'd stay at a place in Bognor.
 
The owner was the chef.
 
He made the best oatmeal and one time that I didn't go he sent some of his oats back to me.
 
 

My friend would alwany feed his cat even though he said he didn't like the guests to give the cat tidbits.
 
She said he didn't mean her.
 
One day her English breakfeast (she always had that when we were there) cam out really fast.
 
It took a minute but after studing the plate I found he had served her part of the regular foods along with a big pile of dry cat food.
 
I told her, I guess he does mean you because the plate said don't feed my cat people food or I'll feed you cat food.
 
She still fed the cat.
 
Bloody English Woman that she was. 

Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and in fact, I've been known to eat it for lunch and dinner too.  I love all the "breakfast" foods but then, since this is the new year and I have that diet thing staring at me, I start trying to make them "diet-friendly" -- still good, but not as.

I desperately miss having an English Breakfast (sans mushrooms as I'm allergic), but since I got put on the low cholesterol diet, it's not the same using egg substitute and turkey bacon/sausage. Fried bread is out too, darn it. *sigh*

At least I can still have broiled tomatoes!

Thanks for bringing back lovely memories of breaking my fast when I lived in London and traveled to various B&Bs every other weekend. Hard to believe that was more than 20 years ago...

AHHH, first pancake breakfast of the new year,with raw honey and bananas, and medium roast Colombian ...BUT,And this is almost a 100% rule...FRESH FRUIT,either juiced,or unadulterated cut up...not processed,bottled,homo.,or any other way to kill the essential ingrediments...however,vegetables can be substituted if an apple is added to the juicer with themthat is the way to maintain weight and health. Your body needs those essential cellular parts to rebuild and repair.  THEN, you can eat stuff to keep you from being hungry,or stuff that reminds you of happier times,or just what's convenient.  BUT...First eat fresh!!!         Make that an easy to follow resolution.

I agree Carol, RY and Ivan sound like my kind of fellas, too.  Actually, they know they're both my kind of fellas, but in the sense of making a good breakfast, I mean.
 
I love men who love to cook, and a lazy morning breakfast made by one of my favorite guys -- it's about as good as it gets.
 
I'd give a full English breakfast a try, I like those tomatoes (to-mah-toes) up there, but I can't see doing all of it justice.  But I'd try a bit of this and that, if it didn't involve innards.
 
No innards, and no head cheese.
 
That's why God invented Hefty trash bags.

I hope I didn't understate the importance of breaking your fast with fresh fruit or veggies.Your body needs them

Park4~my dog thinks that's why God invented HIM

RY:  add some very good whiskey to the dried mustard mixture.  Which is something you might already do:  I forgot you and Carole went to Mt. Horeb last year, so if it's about mustard, you probably know the different add-ins.
 
This whiskey mustard seems to go well with ham, but since I don't eat ham all that much, I found it goes well with beef.
 
It probably goes well with everything, if you think about it.
 
Except pancakes.
;)

Fruit:  that's my favorite part of breakfast.  It's why I own an orange juice squeezer thing, aka juicer, and why it's broken and needs to be replaced because I use it so much.
 
O.J. (premade) is better now than it used to be, taste wise, but no matter what brand I buy, there's nothing like the real thing.  (baby)
 
(Sounds like the makings of a song, there, what do you think?)
 
 
 

Julia: Be careful with how much you use. For real horseradish, I use an amount about same size as the nail on my pinky-finger.

I have also tried tabasco, green chili sauce, and parmesan cheese (not all at the same time). All worked very well.

What makes me sad is, because of various internal sensitivities, I usually don't eat much more than toast for breakfast.

But that doesn't mean I can't have breakfast for lunch.

If there is anything better than leftover warmed up pizza for breakfast, I want it taken out to the back shed and buried beneath the compost pile immediately! 

But semi-seriously .. .. .. My favorite breakfasts have always been found on the road in places like Cracker Barrel, Denney's, The Egg and Eye, Nickerson's Farm with the ever-present bee hive built into the wall, or just about any busy truck stop.

The best breakfasts are always road trip breakfasts where you load up so you don't have to stop for lunch. Today I'll have a Denver omelets, crispy hash browns, a thick slice of country ham, biscuits and gravy with extra pepper, and to stay within a stones throw of the topic...... an English muffin with every nook and cranny filled to the brim with butter. Oops..... I almost forgot the side of pumpkin-pecan pancakes and bottomless cuppa joe.

AN English breakfast???? I like to think that there are no boundaries or borders when it comes to good food that's bad for you!

Ooh ooh....... Bacon!

Peace out!

and then there's steak-n-eggs.......... by just writing this I have already violated every food related resolution for 2010.  WHew, glad that's over with!

This  is  the  year  I hope  to  secure  a  patent  for  my  special  creation,    negative  calorie  foods.   Celery  and  carrot  sticks  don't  count,  instead   I'm  working  on  double  fudge brownies. 
The  calories  expended  in  chewing,  swallowing,  and  digesting  the  brownies  exceed  the  calories  contained  in  the  brownies  themselves,  hence  the  name.     There  is  only  one  problem......the  only  way  I  get  the  empirical  data  to  support  my  thesis  is  under  the  circumstance  where  I  forget  the  brownies  are  in  the  oven  until  smoke  overcomes  the  entire  house,    indicating  that  the  brownies      {which  now  resemble  charcoal  brickettes}  are  virtually  impossible  to  digest  in  less  than  72  hours......

USED TO BE that my fovorite breakfast was a Bloody Mary.  Tmes, they are a-changin'... Now I guess it's an ice cold Ensure (plain vanilla).

TOMMY-T:  My Congratulations ... You are a True Gourmand !!!  Saw Mill Gravy is a Treat that not many above the Mason/Dixon Line have ever enjoyed ... It is especially good if the Milk is fresh from the Tit that mornin' and the Clabber has risen to the top, and when you scrape the crispin's off the bottom of the skillet, they're almost crunchy like Cracklins, but not burnt ... A great reason to stretch Breakfast out for a while ...
 
Carol - Julia - Park4, and all you Ladies out there ... A Man who cooks(most of the time) cooks very well, because Men like to eat ...   But I'll guarantee you that any Man who can cook not only appreciates a woman who can cook, but really enjoys a woman who can EAT !!! ... Sharing a meal together is actually a very intimate experience, and can do a lot to build a great relationship between a man and a woman, because that simple act is an strong expression of Trust ... and a hearty appetite is a good thing, an honest thing ... as long as the woman doesn't snorkle her way thru the food and start sucking her teeth while excavating with a Lee Press-On Nail, like Roseanne Barr .......
 
KORTHAL:  Making your First Morning Pot the nite before is a great idea ... The Pot around here is purdy much on 24/7, which is why we used to buy a new pot every month, until we got a Three Globe Bunn Machine wired and plumbed into the Kitchen ... A Tip;  Whatever machine you choose, see if you can get one with a conical Melita-Style Basket ... That concentrates the grounds and the water thru it and enables you to use about a third less Coffee, while still getting a good, strong brew, rather than Stumpwater that you can read the Newspaper thru ... (We still do Tea the old fashioned way, and even it isn't thin)
 
PETER LAKE:   Forget your 2010 Resolutions, and start working on Resolutions for 2012, and give yourself time to get used to 'em and work yourself up to them ... And besides, your priorities may change once 1929 settles back in again .......

"as long as a womand doesn't snorkle her way through food" -- IVAN JALOPKIN, that's laugh out loud funny.
 
I'm still laughing.  Out loud.
 
Snorkle food!
 
 
oh Ivan!
how you talk!
 
;)
 
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xv5t70u-ZI
 
 
A bittersweet song for a January 2 kind of Saturday afternoon...

Park4:   Love   the  song,  but  prefer  Mary  Black's  Celtic  accent.   Judy  Collins  was  my  earlier  favorite.

Park~I'd never heard her. Glad you gave the link. Tragicly beautiful

 PARK4 - Thanks for the beautiful song - so apprprpriate for today. 
After this mornings rude awakening when I discover that some fiend went throughout the town and stole the ten's digits from all of thermometers..... I offer this state of mind. Six degrees, why bother? 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWXcjYNZais

IVAN - Resolutions .. .. .. Why I make them every morning after I settle down from the thrill of waking up, yet again.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxBDj5YVkj8&feature=related
 
From that same great year, 1966, the Shadows of Knight.
 
Golly, can you guess the name of the song?  haha.
 
They were a basement band.  Mount Prospect?  They went to Prospect HS I think. 
Anyhow:   We of the Prom Committee (cough cough) went to hear them play, to see if we wanted them for Prom. 
Of course, we did.
I don't think they played any other song than this one.
 

Worth seeing, on TCM, tonight:
 
8:00 PM EST
Lolita (1962)

Vladimir Nabokov's racy classic focuses on an aging intellectual in love with a teenager.
Cast:
James Mason, Sue Lyon, Shelley Winters, Peter Sellers
Dir:
Stanley Kubrick BW-153 mins, TV-14
 
 
The original version, and it's very good.  The acting, especially James Mason and Shelley Winters (as the worst mother ever) -- it's certainly not going to shock you, Nabokov's book was banned, and this movie X-rated, but what was "racy" on the screen in 1962 isn't so racy now. 
 
But this movie isn't about sex. It's about obsession, and Mason does obsession so well, it's scary.  Creepy, really.     
 
A great cast, but watch James Mason.  He makes Humbert Humbert a character you'll never forget -- even if you desperately want to.
 
 
 

There is something sexy about a man cooking breakfast in the kitchen. His reply?  "There is something sexy about a woman taking out the garbage."

He knows to hit me with this statement on a half a cup of coffee, before my defense gears fully engage.

HAPPY New Year Sepia Train passengers!

Anyone need your trash taken out to the curb?

I love breakfast anytime, and I like making it too. Breakfast, I mean...
Sometimes it's pancakes with pecans and maple syrup, sometimes it's mega-omelets, sometimes breakfast burritos, sometimes a breakfast smoothie with bananas, peanut butter, rice milk, and honey. Sometimes it's all of the above.
There's something sensuous about foothering in the kitchen in my silk nighty with a robe over it (or not), barefooted and tasting everything and sly looks at Himself as he reads the paper, making the coffee strong and the mimosas too, quick kisses between the pancakes browning just so...
Then there's the eating of it, and the taking to bed with the special tray and the fresh strawberries and the cream...the giggles and the foot-tickling then the wrestling and so on.
Viva breakfast!

You should probably watch "Lolita" Olivia.   You're already most of the way there.
 
 
 
 

PARK4 - The were indeed one-hit wonders.  I give 'em an 8 'cos they were easy to dance to and their lyrics so profound.  I'm gonna shout all night.......

and I was just thinking about poached eggs on toast.

PARK4:  You have prolly have never seen Roseanne Barr eat ....... She is an embarassment to Jewish Women everywhere, and an embarassment to Womanhood in general ....... Its like watching Horton's Sister at the City Dump, complete with the adenoidal Trumpeting ... the most horrific realization is discovering that all the sounds in the Lower Register are Flatus ....... She is the reason Spago put in a Drive-Thru Window ...
 
PETER LAKE:  The kind of Ritual you speak of, sounds like practicing for Marriage .......
 
 
James Mason was so very wrong for that part, that it worked ... and superbly so, owing to the marvelous Talents of all the Players ....... Gave the entire concept of Middle-Aged Desperation Monomania and entirely new and more definitive Face .......

Olivia: Can I come to breakfast at your house?

Go for it, JPL.
 
We're having chili, if we can keep the ice from forming over it when we try to eat it.
 
Wowzers. 
 
Global colding, I guess.
 
Stay warm; I'm gone...

I loooove poached eggs on rye toast w/ butter.mmmm.............
 
JALOPKIN- You've kind of put me off food temporarily w. your descriptions of Roseanne Barr- I never watched that show more than once & never understood her appeal. Gross...
 
PARK- I have never been able to watch more than a few minutes of "LOLITA"- there's just something about it that is creepy, but not creepy in a way that makes me want to watch- creepy in a creepy way.
 
A man who cooks is a man I love...

English Prof. M.
 
MAY I come to breakfast at your house?  Hmmm?  Do I need to go to the blackboard?

I lied.
I'm back.
 
Hi bebe!  Yes, it is creepy, it's James Mason's obsession that's creepy.  If it was just the sex, it wouldn't be so bad I think, but it's way more than sex with Humbert Humbert -- as IVAN said (hello IVAN!) it's "Middle-Aged Desperation Monomania" -- it makes me want to take a shower after I watch it.
 
Obsession.
 
That's a dark world.
 
 
Okay, now that I graced your lives again with my drivel, I am really truly out of here.
 
Enjoy your evening, all!

I miss Park, and I fear Michael will make me clean the earsers too.

Penn: I'm not the sort of Prof. who gets worked up about outdated grammatical nuances.

Whewwww.

Now go clean the erasers.

I'm allergic to...soft, white, porous sedimentary rock, which is a form of limestone composed of the mineral calcite. It forms under relatively deep marine conditions from the gradual accumulation of minute calcite plates (coccoliths) shed from micro-organisms called coccolithophores.  Achoo. Please pass the Kleenex.

PARK-noooooooooooooooo, don't goooooooooooooooooo....
 
I am now officially bereft...

Three AYEM breakfast grand slammer at Denny's?  Not for many a year. But then, it is a right of passage.And waffle House #3.   But then you grow a little more,and it becomes Eggs Benedict,or,Florentine...and then you grow a little older, and it's soft 3minit,and then you learn how to eat....and so you have the stories here displayed.   A good reason to want to wake up

Sorry Bebe, not even sure how that stream came about ....... I guess it was my considering and appreciation for a woman who isn't afraid to Eat, but remembering watching Roseanne across the room and feeling like the place we were in was a Gilt-edged Truck Stop ...  Didn't mean to put you off your feed .......  Have some Chocolate, you'll feel better ....... And Bebe;  I cook ... Not always Kosher, but World Class all the way ....... I've got an Uncle in Oklahoma who married an Indian Girl, and some time after I joined Tribe so's I could get Discounts in the Casinos up there and in New Mexico ... I became the only Indian on my Block with two sets of dishes .......(But I'm not crazy about the Leather underware) ...

RY- when we travel- I love to stop at Waffle House- I have to say- it is always good when you are really hungry & the fact that the waitresses are incredibly nice. Huddle House, on the other hand, is gross.
I love eggs benedict & haven't had them in forever.

PARK- I am actually watching this movie for the first time & I have to say that if I lived w/ Shelley Winters I would be lusting after a garden gnome or maybe the neighbor's dog. She really had it down playing the annoying, clingy woman.

I missed "Old Yeller" which was on immediately preceding Lolita.  Dog gone.......... it.

eleven after nine on the eastern seaboard...the bar is now open.

I can't read or watch "Old Yeller." I used to read "Where the Red Fern Grows" to my 6th graders & when the really heartbreaking part came I would have a guest reader step in because I could not control my crying.
 
Dogs so deserve an English breakfast, a forever home, & people who love them.

It's fascinating how often the topic of food comes up in our discussions.... not sex, not drink, not music, not odors... but food.  And there's a Food Channel for 24-hour-a-day coverage of eating, cooking, and so on.   We humans are interesting animals..........

 

After watching three farmers from Scotland surround the "Full English" at our London hotel for several mornings, I gave it a try at lunch time.

The over-easy eggs atop fried potatoes were good, the sauteed mushrooms and grilled tomatoes; great, the thick, limp bacon; forgettable, the smoked fish; surprisingly moist and tasty and the two kinds of sausage; either overly subtle or the product of too little imagination like plain boiled meat and cereal in casings.

I recalled, as a boy, helping our neighborhood sausage maker, Mr. Dibiasi, or, "Deebs," as my older brothers called him, dump two large scoops of seasonings and spices into a forty pound batch of ground meat and crushed ice.

"Well," he reasoned, "you're gonna be burping anyway... it might as well taste good." 



 

bebe:  so funny -- a garden gnome, no kidding.  I think she might have created the best worst mother character in movie history, in this movie.  It's that method acting thing, maybe
 
oh-I remembered now what was the strange(-est) part of that movie, which was Peter Sellers popping up here and there, and doing a monologue.  The movie didn't need Sellers role at all.  Bad call by Kubrick, is what I understand.  James Mason made me squirm all over again, and if it had been earlier, and warmer, I would have taken a shower.  Lyons was only 14.  I knew she was young, but she was really really young. 
 
And about Old Yeller.  I haven't been able to watch that movie in decades and decades.  I could never read the book. 
 
And there was another animal movie, "The Incredible Journey" or something.  Oh just shoot me, I feel so miserable after I see these two films.
 
I guess I'll stick to creepy James Mason types.

Stoney:  I will never eat bacon again after your description. 
 
 
Nice to see you, and a happy new year to you!