A Turkey for your Leftovers
I ate too much for Thanksgiving. I mean, not like a little too much, I mean like way the hell, what where you thinking too much. I just kept gobbling down the mashed potatoes, stuffing, chicken, and cranberries. I don’t know what possessed me, but I sure stuffed myself. Chicken, you ask? I’m allergic to turkey. And, in case you were wondering, no I don’t miss it. It’s tastes to me a bit like plastic. Imagine if you will some little green men landing from mars who come into your house, announce proudly, “we come in peace” and then start munching on those little plastic cases we humans use to store video casettes. “Hmmm,” you might say, “I don’t really need those since most of my stuff is now on DVD but I find it a bit odd that they actually chew on and like to swallow such an object.” That’s how I feel when I watch you eat turkey. Sure, I *could* chew some myself, but it wouldn’t be like eating anything that resembles food.
Speaking of eating food, I sure was good at it over the Thanksgiving break. For those of you overseas, Thanksgiving is this yearly, um “feast” where we stuff ourselves with “traditional” foods like turkey, ham, stuffing, potatoes, cranberries, etc. and we all go home to spend time with our collective families and chow down for one gigantic meal, after which we collapse on the couch. It’s really quite a popular holiday. Supposidly, the historic significance is that it exists to mark the anniversary of the pilgrims pigging out with the Indians, although many of us find this historical perspective more than a bit slanted and rather hard to believe. Pilgrims pigging out? That had that much food? And they cooked and ate it after laying down the axe and inviting the Indians, those previously thought of as wild heathens, in for a sit down meal? Still, we schlep ourselves all the way home, gobble down our turkey (or chicken in my case), run out to the mall to shop it off, and then we schlep back to work on Monday morning.
Another custom is that Thanksgiving is, like Easter and unlike Christmas, always on the same day of the week. It’s a Thursday and it usually occurs at the end of November. It used to be said that you knew you had a good job when you got to take the day after Thanksgiving off and go shopping. Either that or you are a doctor in which case, you are very smart but you don’t get to take many days off.
The day after Thanksgiving (a Friday in case you weren’t paying attention) marks the “beginning of the Christmas season” and is usually celebrated by mass shopping in malls across the ‘States. Some poor woman was actually trampled at a Wal-Mart near you. It’s insanity. At least I, a consummate mall-a-phobe, sometimes view it as the beginning of the end. I can actually envision myself, after death, standing at the gates of Hell, and, as the devil himself swings them open for me, exclaims, “come in, dear Carol. Everything today is 50% off. Hurry, get your famine and pestilence while they last.” Oh joy, the wonders of the beautiful holiday season. This year I opted to avoid the malls entirely and slept on the couch. A wonderful Thanksgiving it was indeed. I am truely thankful for the couch.
I did get to see HIM this weekend. HE’s doing ok. Just finished a release at work and got back from a trip overseas. Hasn’t been playing chess all that much and is sorting through pictures from France and Germany. He was also not-so-secretly coveting a trip to the great white north to go snowboarding but, alas, he cannot afford to take the time. I never saw HIM as much of a snowboarded, so it’s probably all just as well. It’s really horrible when reality ruins a perfectly good fantasy and, in this case anyway, I’m also thankful it didn’t.
Until next time, this is Carol, the Carol in “Carol’s Little World” signing off and being thankful.
