Happy Thanksgiving week!

Honestly, these big family events drive me nuts.  Why?  Oh, many reasons. 

But first, here's an observation that seems obvious...the problem with this bloggy thing is that you're learning so very much about me and I don't know for sure who even reads this thing.  BTW, thanks to all of you that admit to reading this literary flotsam.  Just in case you didn't know...when I say: "I welcome comments", this means comments encouraged, emails appreciated, because I'd enjoy learning your thoughts or views.

Do people know the definitions of: sublime, surreal, epic, awesome, supercalifragilisticexpedalidocious, and prawn?  No, I don't think they know, either. 

Growing up, I was spoiled.  I only had one brother, one sister, 4 cousins.  A huge number of 2nd cousins, but most of them didn't come to most events....because we didn't get together with Grandma's side of the family too often....in the later years.  Seems like we did get together more often when I was younger.  Here's an example.

Once upon a time, in a land far to the south, Grandma and Grandpa lived on a farm that they rented from some guy named Davison.  Maybe it was Davidson...I don't know and honestly, I don't really care.  It was a decent enough place, kind of a small house, a nice sized chicken coop, 2 car garage, 2 barns, a nice sized machine shed, but a long dirt driveway, which caused all sorts of problems most of the year.  That does not pertain to this story, so disregard all of that about the driveway.  BTW, it's been covered with gravel.  This story occured in 1975 or 76, I'd guess.  Michael Scott Leighton the boy came to visit with his family, along with some others;  Grandma had about 35 sisters and 2 brothers, each of them had SEVERAL kids.  Some had 2 kids, some 3, some 17 from several marriages.  There could be an exaggeration here or there, reader beware.  The exaggeration has ended.  Michael Scott Leighton the girl comitted this terrible act of abuse to a perfectly good bowl of homemade ice cream.  Ok, Ok.  I refer to him in that way because he ALWAYS announced his presence by stating:  I am Michael Scott Leighton the boy.  To torture him, we ammended it to "girl", but I'm not going to speculate how his fellow inmates reacted to this announcement.  Perhaps he gave it up as he got older.  Ok. so we're at Grandma's house, we have home made ice cream, and a whole house of cousins.  The 'boy' thought he'd be clever and funny, so he went to the hen house and got an egg, put it on the ice cream.  Just his bowl, he didn't ruin it for all of us.  BUT an egg was not enough, so he declared that he was going to crap onto it, and he did indeed do exactly that.  Someone went to tell on him, I'm sure he disposed of the evidence, and I'm also sure that his mother didn't beat him, because if she had, he wouldn't have done it in the first place, and if she did, he wouldn't have grown up as such an asshole to wind up in prison.

Yep, asshole cousins on both sides of the family.  We have not even begun to talk of the step cousins that arrived when Dad married the stepmonster or the step cousins that appeared when Grandpa Hoffman married Mary. 

Disclaimer:  I too am an asshole cousin.  Just ask around. 

As I was lying in bed last night waiting to sleep, I was distracted by a list of names of people that I'd be honored to attend Thanksgiving with.  Yep, there were some relatives on there, but not too many.  I wonder....should I list the names???

Ok, so I could waffle on and on, but bottom line is this.  I'm thinking that I would rather hang out with people that I like and enjoy the company of rather than a bunch of people that I don't really like or enjoy their company.  I'm not the sort of person that can pretend to be having fun.

Family events, right.  Should be fun, right?  Usually not...usually very stressful.  Why?  because people are cooking stuff they don't usually cook, entertain people they know well or even like.  Cook amounts/quantities of stuff they're not familiar with, new recipes, running out of crap, can't find stuff, equipment failure, spoilage, personality conflicts, throwball games, drunk dumbasses, transporting stuff over the river and thru the woods...it gets cold or hot and the foil sticks or falls off allowing it to get dirty or you drop it and the damn dog that smells like that third skunk you passed 45 miles ago grabs it up and eats it or rolls on it or trips you so you drop everything and twist your back so now you're in intense pain, but since no one pays attention, everyone has to ask what happened or why your back hurts.  Even though they saw what happened, they have to ask 4 times.  And what usually happens when you are near that 3rd dead skunk, is that someone inevitibly hits the damn thing, causing the huge amount of decomposition gases to rapidly escape (think balloon), causing it to fly up, and splat on your windshield.  Now...you are smart enough to not use the wipers to try to get this greasy bloody gut smeared abomination off your glass, so you stomp on the brakes to attempt to dislodge it.  Whoops, you forgot that Mayhem  has been here to visit your trip over the river and through the woods in the form of black ice. Or if you're on a concrete road, it'd be grey ice.  Never mind if you're on the gravel.  Yep, ABS is a wonderful thing, when it works, but it can't work on the mirror smooth ice and you've got your foot jammed to the floor like that time you were stomping and clapping to the beat of Queen's we will rock you.  stomp stomp clap stomp stomp clap  we will we will rock you rock you.  (good luck with that ear worm, my friend)  So. Your front wheels have locked, the back trades places with the front, now the inside of the car smells as bad as the outside and is about as colourful, since all those goodies you spent so much time on have splatted around....think Maytag washer spin cycle...and I don't know what happens next, because I had kept the correct following distance, and was able to react in a controlled, safe manner, execute a move and get the hell out of the way of your wood paneled minivan, aka dorkmobile.  All I know is that you need new shortyshorts, and Victoria's secret is not open on Thanksgiving.  Kwik Trip does not yet sell fancy filmy underpants, and we all know you can't have unsightly lines...good luck with all that!

What else?  never enough bathrooms, house is too hot, never enough salt/pepper shakers, too many people insist on serving margarine instead of butter, kids and pets need to go out for exercise, someone has to have the damn throwball game on, with the volume turned WAY UP!

This is the 3rd day I've hammered at this, my hand hurts, I'm tired.  I'm going to make pie and bread and other stuff tomorrow (Wednesday before Tday)

I don't know what's wrong with my hand.  It probably needs to knead some bread and mix some pie filling.  It's my left hand, don't be thinking any weird thoughts.