Thanksgiving update, part II

I love Thanksgiving.

Somebody like Joke, who has listened to my many rants about Thanksgiving, might be surprised to hear this. But it's true.

See, the problem with previous Thanksgivings is that I have always been at someone else's house sitting around while someone else cooks. Sometimes the food was execrable (at my mother's) sometimes it was excellent (at my mother-in-law's), but Thanksgiving meant hours sitting around waiting for a meal. And nothing to do, really, except make small talk and read catalogs.

Well, this year, I had plenty to keep me busy.

We:

flew from Chicago to New Hampshire;

upon our arrival, we discovered that the dining room and kitchens were stuffed with living room furniture because the painter was putting the finishing touches on the trim
because the floor refinisher hadn't finished in time;

see the pretty floor?

and we therefore had to uncover everything and move it back into place, and sweep up a lot of dust;








and shop for a tablecloth big enough to fit the table with all its leaves,

and buy a food processor, toaster, and various other things needed to cook the food,

oh, and buy the food;

and the wine;

then set up the dining room table with the leaves and the table pads and the new tablecloth;

and borrow some candlesticks and a card table from my sister;

and wash towels and sheets to make sure people had clean ones.



Then we had to cook--for meat eaters and vegetarians--

1. Turkey, stuffing, and gravy
2. Sauteed green beans with Parmesan cheese
3. Baked acorn squash
4. Mashed potatoes
5. Penne with a spinach/ricotta/Parmesan sauce
5. Salad of Romaine and Boston lettuces with endive, tomatoes, red onion, crumbled blue cheese, pine nuts and croutons, with a dressing of extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, mayonnaise, and horseradish
6. Salad of wild rice, toasted pecans, raisins, and green onions, in an olive oil and rice vinegar vinaigrette
7. rolls

also:

8. Two sweet potato pies
9. A Pumpkin pecan bundt cake
10. Whipped cream

My in-laws brought:

11. Apple pie
12. Yellow beet salad
13. Nut loaf
14. Vegetarian gravy

Well. Everything was fabulous.

The furniture store had lost our order for a new sofa (in a shining example of "too little, too late," it showed up today) so there was a very strange assortment of things to sit on in the living room.

The oven, which had done some bizarre things to the cakes and pies on Wednesday, finished morphing into Robo-Oven, and cooked a 12 pound stuffed turkey in two--as opposed to four--hours.

In other appliance excitement, the little rubber hose that connected the dishwasher to the disposal split clear through while a full load of dishes was running and dumped gallons of hot Cascade-scented water under the sink and all over the kitchen floor.

So that when I realized which sink still worked, I was up until past midnight handwashing the dishes.

But:

The food was wonderful.

(They're happy, really. It kind of looks like they're praying. But they're just trying to figure out how many calories are on their plates.)

Everyone got drunk.

We have tons of yummy food left over.

It rocked.

So I guess the answer is--work me hard enough and I'll have a great time.

--P.