Today is Thanksgiving Day in the US. It’s a widely celebrated holiday, one in which we spend a lot of time with our families, eating way too much, and relaxing, maybe watching the parade on TV or the continuation of the football season. Thanksgiving is not a holiday many folks outside of the US really understand, but it’s quite big here-it’s family time.
Celebrate the bounty of the harvest? Maybe other cultures do that a bit. Celebrate the big, historic “coming together” of the pilgrims and the Indians in a peaceful setting with extra gravy? Somehow, I think that one is uniquely American in nature.
Tradition dictates that we gather with our families and eat a stuffed turkey, with gravy, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and all of the trimmings. Since I’m allergic to turkey, and nobody in my family really likes it anyway, we tend to have chicken instead. The same “fixings” still apply though-dressing from the oven, gravy, mashed potatoes, yams, cranberries, and egg nog or apple cider to drink. This year, I had not one, not two, but FOUR helpings of stuffing. I’m…well, I guess it’s safe to say….STUFFED for sure. (It was really good though, stuffing with apples, fresh celery, and breaded bits.)
Since it’s the big holiday and all, and I don’t feel much like blogging today, I thought I would give thanks to all of those in bloggy land, and give thanks to all the bounty I’ve enjoyed this year. It’s been a wild ride, in more ways than one, so I have to say (and I really do mean this) THANK YOU. I’m grateful for all of the galleries, patrons, photographers, photo bloggers, writers, artists, shows, camera gear (yes, even that too,) Chase, my family, my friends, and everything that’s happened this year. It really has been something just shy of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride and I thank you for following along (or, you know, at least trying to as best you can from afar.)
I’ve uploaded this picture in honor of the Red Leaf Diaries. While I don’t think this picture is the best picture I’ve ever taken (not by a long shot) I thought it was very representative of autumn in Austin. You can sort of see how the trees almost want to kind of change red (ish) and see what the “big picture” from the Red Leaf Diaries looks like.
One last final important note about Thanksgiving-it’s followed by a day retailers have dubbed “Black Friday” which is traditionally filled with shopping, shopping, and more shopping. Look for a blog post on this to follow for sure (blogger fodder alert!) but, suffice it to say, this year the advertisers have gone “all out” with lots of circulars, ads, “holiday discount specials” and the like. The newspaper was so filled with such things we could hardly lift it and it took me almost three hours to casually flip through the sales. Wow. What can I say? Let the shopping begin! (I guess that would be appropriate.)
It’s a rather nice day outside so I shall end this rambling “non-blog” of a blog post by saying I hope you have a great Thanksgiving or can enjoy a bit of autumn wherever you are as well.
Until next time…
