Thanksgiving 2011

The cooking started at 2:30 am. Not because that's what I intended; I just happened to wake up and thought I might as well get the turkey going. By 3:00 am that dude was in the oven on his way to becoming the centerpiece of our Turkey Day feast. Allow me to digress a bit. This years festivities will best go down in history as the impromtu celebration. We were supposed to go to Tennessee for the day but due to several very last minute logistics problems and a slightly sick kid we had to cancel and I was pressed into service to come up with something at least mildly better than Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving dinner of popcorn and toast. Coming out of the shoot I had two made-from-scratch sweet potato pies up my sleeve. That was all I had planned to make since the relatives were providing everything else. I had bought nearly everything needed earlier in the week, intending to make a small version of Turkey day just for my family over the weekend. After sizing up my situation I threw my frozen turkey in some cold water and headed out to join the grocery store malay on Turkey day eve. The crowds weren't really all that bad. I picked up a few things I needed and had a chuckle with someone when we spotted another shopper leaving the store without their turkey. They had left it in the bagging area. The grocery store employees laughed and sent one of their own chasing after the bonehead with a big turkey in tow. People are so stupid.

Besides the turkey I made a batch of fried apples, fancy glazed carrots in grape juice and honey, stuffing, broccoli, peas and cranberry sauce (of course). We wouldn't want to forget the cranberry sauce now would we?. I keep several cans in my well-stocked pantry year-round for just such an emergency.

I do my turkeys sort of like barbeque in that I slow cook them. 225 degrees until the insides are at least 160 deg. By 9:00 am it was done and with 1 hour to rest the meat so the juices wouldn't run out I was only an hour and a half early to show time. I don't cook a whole turkey very often so I tend to err way on the side of caution so we won't be waiting on it. It was done in about 6 hours and while carving it really just fell apart. Juicy and tender to boot. I have to confess that I spilled WAY too much spice on that poor bird but it turned out to be pretty tasty in the end. Whatever it was, it was green and I'm lucky the Turkey came out of the oven brown and not green. I would have had trouble coming up with a valid reason for eating green turkey.

The carrots and apples were made from fresh ingredients and were really good. A suggestion was made to combine them into one dish and I think that is a good one. There is something really good about fried apples in the fall. It must be the slight nip in the air and the smell of dried leaves that does it. Add to that the pumpkin pie spice and fresh lemon juice and you just can't miss.

The sweet potato pie was tasty. Easy made, it is little more than boiling a few potatoes and then mixing them up with a bunch of junk and pouring it all into a shell. Those shells are courtesy of the grocery store, by the way. I don't do homemade shells. It's not in my contract. I copped out on the other desserts. I really wanted to make everyone feel like they were having a big meal so I bought two other pies. Mrs. Smith provided a berry and a chocolate pie. Nothing to it, just thaw the chocolate one and cook the berry pie in the toaster oven.

All in all I was satisfied with the results and I didn't hear any complaints from the peanut gallery. They took about 10 minutes to wolf it all down and it was all over. I've been cleaning dishes in stages so it doesn't seem like so much to do. The refrigerator is so stuffed with leftovers I don't think I'll be cooking for the rest of the weekend. That's not a bad thing either.

Marshall made the turkey in the picture. We kept it on the table while we ate and giggled about it the whole time. It was good enough to take a picture.

After the feast I managed to connive my wife to snuggle on the couch with me (not easily done). I fell asleep and when I woke up she was complaining that I had drooled all over her hair. Poor girl, that'll learn her to marry me.

Tomorrow is black Friday and I'm keeping my happy ass at the house. It'll be turkey for breakfast, turkey for lunch, and turkey for supper. I should really just send out for Chinese.

Naked girls and noodles

What do car wrecks, topless girls, Vietnamese restaurants, and sharks all have in common? The answer is pretty intuitive if you don’t dwell on it very long. They were all part of our Florida vacation, of course. Read on if you have a minute for all of the noodle slurping, death defying details. Pay attention as there might be a pop quiz at the end.
You remember of course my bellyaching about last year’s vacation. The 4th of July in Destin, Fl. amid hordes of tourists, foreigners, drunk partying college kids, and fat Canadian businessmen. I wanted quiet beaches, a few seagulls, and the occasional banner towing airplane. Naturally I endured the total opposite. Destin was crowded and locked down into a traffic jam the entire time. On our way to a flea market last year, we passed through a dumpy little outskirts town called Navarre. It was the sort of run down, destitute, poor Florida town I had been dreaming of. I mentioned to the wife that we ought to spend our next vacation there away from the upscale tinsel town that Destin has transformed into.
So in February I went to work planning our getaway. I picked out a nice hotel and booked it for 5 days several months in advance. In retrospect, this was an uncharacteristically smart move on my part. The rates went crazy in July and the hotel clerk told me he had to turn away 30 people one night. Apparently, every hotel on the beach was full. I missed out on an opportunity to heckle another hotel guest who was complaining about the high price of her stay to the clerk. Better luck next time.
We found the place easy enough and enjoyed the ride down below Montgomery (after lunch at “Chinatown”) since it was all 2 lane country roads. There was no plan for what to do other than enjoy the beach. That was a slight problem because our beach front hotel didn’t really have a beach to speak of. It was about 10’ wide and 400’ long and faced an inlet. There had to be something better. I asked Kathy to find out what the spit of land on the other side of the inlet was. It looked like another beach. She asked a 12 year old kid running a wave runner concession and the kid told her it was an air force base. We rode over there the next morning and found it to be the beach we had hoped for. Stupid kid. Anyway, the beach was nearly empty that morning so we settled down with our toes in the sand and enjoyed the quiet surf. And that is about all we really did the entire time except for hitting the flea market and eating out twice a day. But what about the car wrecks, topless girls, Vietnamese restaurants, and sharks? Be patient, I’m getting to it.

Topless girls!

Okay, not girls, but girl. MY girl. Kathy had a little wardrobe malfunction while we were out in the surf one day. The wave came crashing over us (the waves were very rough all week) we jumped up, but her bikini top didn’t. She’s standing there, wiping the salt water out of her eyes, and her top was hanging down around her belly. The funny thing was that she didn’t even notice. I finally told her that her tits were hanging out and she quickly put them up. No one else noticed but me and the 450 or so people on the beach she was facing. She’s prone to this sort of accident. Years ago when she took swimming lessons, the same thing happened only it was her little brother and the swimming instructor who were watching. Speaking of bikinis, the first one she tried on was way too skimpy. She was all ready to prance out the door with it on but I told her that unless she was planning on auditioning to be a stripper she might want to opt for something a little more demure.

Car wrecks!

On the last night of our visit, we decided to walk across a long bridge to get to the fishing pier. The bridge was very busy and also narrow. Some clown tried to make a U-turn right in the middle of it and ended up smacking a pizza delivery guy in the rear. After that all traffic came to a dead standstill except for the two of us trucking along in the pedestrian lane. We came up on the scene and Kathy checked out everyone to make sure they were ok (required of Nurses by law). While she was interviewing the victims, I made inquiries to the pizza delivery guy about purchasing a slightly used pizza for a sizable discount but unfortunately it had already been delivered. After we left the accident scene we were asked about what was going on up ahead by every 3rd car or so in line. It was only fun for a little while until I realized it would take forever to get to the fishing pier if we had to explain the situation to so many people. I do admit to having just a little fun telling several of them how screwed they were until both vehicles were towed away by the as yet un-arrived tow trucks.
There were quite a few people fishing on the pier and catching some small ones but nothing really sizable. Interesting that I saw so many foreigners. I suspected they were going to eat whatever they caught. On the way back across the bridge we stopped at a local open-air bar for beer and fish tacos (for me). Kathy had to have a girlie drink but didn’t have enough of them to become interested in the fish tacos.

Sharks!

I saw a shark. We were in the water. We got the heck out of there fast. No, I didn’t see a dolphin, a shadow, or a mirage either so if you are going to tell me it was probably something else just click your heels together 3 times and say to yourself: “it really was a shark”. I’d say it was about 3’ to 4’ long.

Vietnamese Restaurant

The one day we went to Destin for a little shopping we got caught up in a bad traffic jam which is rapidly becoming what Destin is most widely known for. After shopping the chance of getting something to eat without waiting outside in line for 3 hours was getting slim. Kathy picked out a place with a “Pho” in the name of it somewhere so in desperation we headed to it. As soon as we walked in I realized that we were the only two white people in there. Undaunted, we sat down and listened to the incomprehensible jabbering of the regulars while we waited for our food. It was surprisingly good, too. Pretty different from the standard Chinese stuff I’m used to. However; Eastern folks have a different set of standards when it comes to eating, particularly when you talk noodles. They love to slurp. I doubt there is an American alive who doesn’t flinch when he accidentally slurps his own noodle soup for fear that his Mom heard him and is about to slap him upside his head. Apparently, it’s a form of appreciation for a really good noodle in other parts of the world. For me, it’s simply a good way to turn my stomach. They backed us up to a table of 4 noodle slurping Vietnamese in order to ensure that we got the full dining experience. In spite of the ambiance and background noises, the tea was wonderful since it was loose and not the horrible bagged kind so I’m game for a return visit. Next time I’m going back to show those guys who can be more obnoxious when he eats. Maybe I’ll start by putting a chop stick in each nostril just to psych them out. That ought to level the playing field somewhat.

Well, there’s another vacation in the books. 5 days of sun, surf, and sand with a splash of naked girls and noodles.

Take a ride in Mr. Peabody's wayback machine

In a previous post, I talked about time and how much it has always fascinated me. I also mentioned that time can only move in one direction and that is forward. However; for the period from 2005-2025 time is indeed going in reverse. There is interest in doing things “the old way”. We are going back to our roots, reviving old, long forgotten techniques and skills that were afraid to have been lost in antiquity. I just saw a review on a retro website for a brand new Sony radio that is retro styled. It looks like it came right out of a 1960s yardsale, wood grained case and all. My wife and I went to “Mule Day” in Tennessee which is coincidentally everything mule. Amongst the vendors selling ticky tack, hot dogs, and balloons were a lady showing how yarn was spun and a man who made corn whisk brooms entirely by hand. One of my hobbies is woodworking. The online discussion group I belong to are constantly chatting about the “great handtool revival” and the increasing interest in selling off power tools to be replaced by 100+ year old hand tools. It’s showing up everywhere, even automobile manufacturers are reintroducing old cars that had their original hayday in the 60’s like the Dodge Charger. The TV channel, “TV land” regularly reruns shows from the same time period. I like it. It’s good to have a revival and throwback to the past. Enjoy it while you can because in February of 2025 we are all going to put our toys back in the closet where they belong. Of note during the same period of time is the interest in the Earth and conservation of all things “green”. It’s not just about saving the whales these days. Now it’s everything but Kudzu. I’ve seen more spins on the “green” thing than I can shake a stick at. Just watch advertising and you will see what I mean.

Saved by Cranberry sauce

Yesterday’s theme was food. Everything that happened to me centered around it. Some of it wasn’t too tasty, either.
I get to work and start unpacking my daily supply of provisions only to find out that my Tupperware jug of grapefruit juice had leaked all over the inside of my lunch box, right on top of my daily planner. The next 20 minutes were frantic, wet, and sticky. I got lucky and didn’t have to toss out any important documents. Breakfast went pretty smooth. I don’t know why I added breakfast except that I like to be thorough.
About mid morning I ran into an unexpected treat in the breakroom: an entire plate full of unmolested, homemade chocolate chip cookies. They must have just been placed there because they were still covered in wrap and were piled pretty high. I wasn’t hungry so I simply made a mental note to swing back by later and grab a few after lunch.
When lunch rolled around my ribs were sticking out. It looked pretty good in the cafeteria so I went through the line and got the baked chicken, mashed potatoes, and lima beans. When I looked down I was just a little miffed. The chicken breast was the smallest I had ever seen. It looked more like the breast of a pigeon than a chicken. I’ve seen a chicken breast or two in my tender years and I know they grow them bigger than that. The mashed potatoes were just barely there to represent their species as well. Jeez, the only thing I’ve got a decent helping of is the lima beans. Oh, the lima beans. They have this recipe for lima beans that will send you into orbit. They look plain but that is just a disguise because they are very spicy. I sometimes dream about them. When I paid for my lunch I made a comment about getting the smallest chicken breast I’ve ever seen which only returned a giggle from the cashier. Oh well. So I sit down, reassuring myself that at least they didn’t jip me on those wonderful beans, only to discover that they were both bland and cold. So there it was before me; skimpy, bland, and barely there. It didn’t take me 5 minutes to choke it all down while holding back just a few tears. After the carnage was over I was contemplating a second helping while whining to everyone within earshot of how little I had actually gotten. Theirs’ was as skimpy as mine as well. We all got quite a shock when we later noticed that the lunches rolling off the assembly line were piled high for everyone else! Big, heaping mounds of mashed potatoes, carrots falling off the plate! Chicken breasts with real meat on them! It wasn’t fair. We had been taken, robbed, swindled. After some discussion and further reconnaissance of the area we concluded that the cafeteria folks were afraid they would run out of food if they gave it all away during the first hour. Remember how you skimped on the candy for the first hour or two last Halloween then when it started getting late you were pouring the rest of the bowl into some kids plastic pumpkin, trying to get rid of it? Our situation was surely the same. We grumbled about it, my belly grumbled about it.

Then the little man on my shoulder reminded me that there were homemade cookies upstairs! That’s right! Homemade chocolate chip. Those cookies would hit the spot and provide just enough sustenance to get me through the afternoon before I starved to death and had to be taken to the hospital before suppertime could save me. Without a word I slipped away from everyone on the way back from lunch to pinch a big handful. As luck would have it, a few other people saw those cookies and no one thought to save any for me. Oh the horror! The plate was even gone! Next time, I’ll squirrel those cookies away ahead of time. So now what am I going to do to keep from starving to death? I had to settle (out of court) for some peanut butter crackers.

My last chance to actually enjoy a meal was approaching at a turtle’s trot since I had to work late and the ride home was plagued with a wreck on the river bridge. It seems like there is a wreck every day on that stupid bridge. I haven’t conducted any studies but I believe that the chances of a wreck on the bridge will increase for me if I have the urge to pee on the way home. Murphy carpools with me.

Supper was looking grim. I hadn’t laid any meat out of the freezer and I didn’t expect to find much in the way of leftovers in the fridge due to the fact that there are two grown kids (vultures) living with me. I was determined that I would scare something up even if I had to kill it first. That or order Chinese takeout. As I walked in I was shocked and surprised to find a miniature Thanksgiving meal was just ready. My wife had cooked a whole chicken with stuffing, vegetables, gravy, rolls, and even had CRANBERRY SAUCE too! WOW! What a feast! I didn’t even bother to look around to see if I had the correct address or pinch myself as if in a dream. I just grabbed a plate and started scooping. We’ll see who wins the portion control game this time! I slobbed down a whole plate full of goodies and just for good measure, went back for seconds. That’ll learn ‘em to try and starve ME at lunch! That was one fine meal too. June Cleaver would have been proud of my wife that day. If she had served me in pearls, pumps, and an apron I would have known I was in Heaven because it couldn’t have gotten better than that.
I semi passed out in my easy chair that evening with the dog and life was good. Well, maybe except for a little indigestion from overeating.