Ah, the traditions different families have for their Thanksgiving day. Some play football, some just watch football, some choose to make dinner an adventure. That last one is my clans' tradition. On one particular Thanksgiving in my youth, my mom and grandma...uh...well, there is no other word for it other than to say they violated a turkey in ways no turkey should be violated. They dropped it, they fondled it and my sister and I will be in therapy for years talking about the trauma the incident inflicted upon us. About eight years ago, my aunt didn't get a turkey until the day before the holiday and it didn't defrost in time and didn't finish cooking til 11 at night, so we didn't have turkey that day. We've also had incidents with deep frying turkeys and, though I don't know whose idea it was to do it, hunting our own turkeys. And of course there was last years debacle of us not eating until eight in the evening. So, as much as I love Thanksgiving and the food and everything else, I am understandably a little uneasy when it comes to the actual dinner part of the day. And this year was almost another miscue.
My family does turkey breast instead of whole turkeys and my aunt tasked my cousins and I with getting this year's birds into the oven while she was out getting us coffee. Imagine our surprise when we cracked open the packaging to find that these birds had legs, something you don't find on turkey breast. We had whole turkeys and no idea how to cook 'em. Someone (read: my mother and I) didn't read the packaging correctly and thus we ended up with big birds. I called my aunt to ask her if we needed to change anything in the cooking but got no answer so I called my mom, whose first reply to my saying, "We have a problem, these are whole turkeys, what do we do?" was, "Wow...we got a whole turkey for $10?". Not helpful. We threw the birds in the oven and went on about our day and checked them four hours later and they looked done. They were not done. So dinner was delayed an hour and was a little slim on turkey since we could only carve the parts that were done. But it's no biggie when you consider we got to eat before nightfall this go round.
All in all, this year was pretty tame compared to years past and for that, I am thankful. A few other highlights of my day:
~ The night before Turkey Day I went to a hockey game with my 53-year-old uncle and he got hit on by some woman. Old people hitting on each other is G.R.O.S.S.
~ Crazy aunt began drinking at 11:30 in the AM when she asked my cousin to put a little liqueur in her Starbucks cup. Four hours later, my cousin walks into the living room to find her (wine glass in hand) completely enthralled by an infomercial for a Trojan vibrator. My cousin walks right back out of the room and claims he is temporarily blind. Later in the night, I come downstairs after taking a phone call and overhear crazy aunt say, "Well I don't see how a ball gag is a turn on". I wish I had been temporarily deaf at the time.
~ Mr. R was moved out of the ICU and is expected to come home on Saturday afternoon. I cannot tell you how relieved I am that the little dude is finally on the mend.
~ Whilst attempting to season a turkey, I get a shot of poultry seasoning in the eyes and up my nose. Burns. Like. A. MOFO. I rinse out my eyes and my sinuses but both still burn hours later. A few minutes prior to dinner I also burned my arm on a turkey pan, making two consecutive Thanksgivings where I've been burned (although this year I was burned in more ways than one. Here's to progress).
~ A definite highlight was getting a chance to sit down and talk to my brother for the first time in awhile. It was borderline productive. Again, here's to progress.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING GIRLS AND BOYS.
