Althouse: Talk about Thanksgiving... or anything...

November 27, 2008

Talk about Thanksgiving... or anything...

... at the Paper Bird Café.

27 comments:

Ron said...: I like the paper birds...though 653 is my Magic Number, not 649!; 11/27/08, 11:49 AM
Darcy said...: Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

I'm preparing a low-key Thanksgiving dinner later...just basic traditions: Turkey, sausage stuffing (outside the bird!), mashed potatoes, sweet potato, homemade gravy and green beens with mushrooms and slivered almonds. Pie of course, too!

I have six siblings, and this is the first year I can remember where we all scattered elsewhere...funny how that happened the first year Mom isn't here anymore (Dad died the year before). I hope this isn't a trend, but it's nice to have a relaxed holiday, to be honest. My son is missing his cousins, though...

Cheers!; 11/27/08, 11:52 AM
Darcy said...: Ron, are you in Ann Arbor? If you are, we're neighbors, sort of (Livonia). My brother has a print shop there...on Plymouth Road called Digital Chicken.; 11/27/08, 11:55 AM
former law student said...: Kohl's and JC Penney's are opening at 4am tomorrow -- has anyone scoped out the doorbuster ads yet? Is anyone planning to go out in the pre-dawn to shop?

Also, when did they start calling tomorrow "Black Friday"? I heard it for the first time 3 or 4 years ago, when it instantly was treated as a long-established usage.; 11/27/08, 12:21 PM
Host with the Most said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 11/27/08, 12:40 PM
Anonymous said...: has anyone heard the new eno/byrne thingy?; 11/27/08, 12:43 PM
Host with the Most said...: Also, when did they start calling tomorrow "Black Friday"?

From wikipedia:

Black Friday is the Friday after Thanksgiving in the United States, where it is the beginning of the traditional Christmas shopping season.

The term "Black Friday" originated in Philadelphia in reference to the heavy traffic on that day. More recently, merchants and the media have used it instead to refer to the beginning of the period in which retailers are in the black (i.e., turning a profit).; 11/27/08, 12:45 PM
Host with the Most said...: Got up at 5 am for the stuffing of the bird - except the turkey, bought last Friday, my first ever frozen "free range" NON-Butterball, was still rock hard frozen after 6 days in a refrigerator.

Called the specialty store i bought the special turkey from. "What temperature did you freeze this down to?"
"Why?"
"Because it's been in garage refriegrator, whose thermometer says 29 degrees F, for 6 days, and it's still mostly frozen. I can't even open the cavities."
"We have someone in Colorado blast freeze 'em right off the farm"

That explains it. Frozen to 22 below zero. That takes 50+ hours at room temperature. All I was doing was keeping the iceberg comfortable.

Dinner was going to be at 2 . . . oh, wait - the wife told me the kids want to cook the stuffing in the oven and have hamburgers while the turkey cooks later. That's after thawing in hot water - and yes, I don't care about the warnings about hot water. That bird is going down today!

Ah, tradition . . .; 11/27/08, 12:46 PM
Bob W. said...: Just finished off the turkey, kids are eating pie right now. I drank two (OK, maybe five) glasses of pinot, feeling a little sleepy. Going to take a shower now, I never even bothered to get dressed today.

Happy Lazy Thanksgiving 2008 from the Acre!; 11/27/08, 12:47 PM
Jeff with one 'f' said...: The idea that mush-headed liberal baby boomers run PBS (and NPR) should seem like a stale joke from the 80's sitcom "Family Ties", but...

..I just switched the channel to NY Cuty's own PBS 13 and found a long-haired Neal Young singing "The Needle and the Damage Done", at 1:30 pm on Thanksgiving Day.

I love Neal Young but fuck you, PBS.; 11/27/08, 12:48 PM
Jeff with one 'f' said...: NY City's; 11/27/08, 12:49 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Happy thanksgiving everybody.

I'll be with mother this year. She is having a big thing at a church hall in Manhattan.

Hundreds of people. I dont know. It sounds like trouble to me but I have to go, as Cubanito would be the first to tell you ;)

Stop by and say hello.
Iglesia San Judas Tadeo 205th st & 10 ave NY, NY.; 11/27/08, 1:11 PM
Donn said...: Kohl's and JC Penney's are opening at 4am tomorrow -- has anyone scoped out the doorbuster ads yet?

Personally, I boycott any business that opens at 4am the day after Thanksgiving, for two main reasons.

One, NO retail business needs to open at that ungodly hour, and second, it ruins Thanksgiving for those that have to work the next day starting at about 3am.

Other than that, Happy Thanksgiving everyone!; 11/27/08, 1:39 PM
Donn said...: has anyone heard the new eno/byrne thingy?

I have it, but so far have only listened to it in "background" mode, so can't say much about it. However, my impression is that I will like Eno's last cd better, but time will tell.

If you want, Mickey, I can upload it later and send you the link?; 11/27/08, 1:43 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: I love Thanksgiving.

Yeast rolls just came out of the oven. The place smells great! Pie was made last night. Stuffing casserole is almost assembled as is the green bean casserole. Carrots are juliened and par boiled.

The turkey has been brining since yesterday and the hubby is taking a well deserved nap after cleaning around his workshop, grading and grooming the orchard. I'm relaxing with a glass of wine and when he gets up.....we will put the turkey in the oven at a low temperature and take a leisurely drive on a forest service road for about an hour. Probably will have to take a few libations with us to smooth out the bumps in the road.

When we get back. Casseroles go into the oven, crank up the temp and baste the bird with some ginger syrup that I have left over from making crystalized ginger. Heat the carrots with their orange sauce.

It is a beautiful clear sunny day. The quail are eating the grain we threw out this afternoon outside my office window.

No black friday shopping for us. There isn't anything we need right now, no matter what the sale price is.

We have so much to be thankful for in our country. Sometimes we forget this in concentrating on the little things and on the differences that we may have with each other. I can't think of another place on Earth that I would want to be right now.; 11/27/08, 3:37 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: Crab patties with apple and fennel salad. Home-made mayonnaise and home-made cranberry relish.

A very modest turkey
plate.

Did you know chestnuts explode? I didn't.

Happy Thanksgiving. And to our Canadian friends, happy belated Thanksgiving to you too. Thanksgiving is a great word for a harvest celebration, in'nit. I believe this is my favorite time of year. Well, apart from summer and spring, it's right up there with winter among my all-time four favorite seasons.; 11/27/08, 5:07 PM
Anonymous said...: Thanksgiving was different this year. Not better, not worse, just different.

In years past, we had Thanksgiving dinner at our home on the appointed day. We began to notice, however, that as the children moved into adult life with its many commitments to newly acquired in-laws, that our Thanksgiving day became rushed.

Dinner had to be early in order that our guests could move along to the next dinner, and for some, the next one after that.

We had family Thanksgiving dinner last Sunday so that the young ones could spend today without concern for schedules; for making everyone in the ever-extending family happy.

My wife and I have come to our small cottage in the woods in northern Wisconsin for our own Thanksgiving holiday. Wood crackling in the fireplace, woodpeckers tapping on trees in the yard, deer wandering past, and squirrels everywhere.

We had a light dinner, a bottle of wonderful wine, and a long walk in the woods. We saw bear tracks, no bears.

Very much like when we first married, and very wonderful.; 11/27/08, 5:10 PM
Anonymous said...: Oh dear God....

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...182417AAwZF1h&

How can I get my labrador dog to stop urinating and defacating on me while I'm sleeping?

"She's 7 years old and in the last few months she has taken to jumping on the bed when I am sleeping and either doing a poo or weeing on me. I don't find out until I wake up in the morning. Why is she doing this and how can I stop her? PS I can't put her outside, I live in a small apartment and it is too cold for her elsewhere."; 11/27/08, 6:32 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: "Why is she doing this and how can I stop her? PS I can't put her outside, I live in a small apartment and it is too cold for her elsewhere"

Answer to clueless questioner. Not Gavin.

Because she is a Labrador Retriever, a dog that needs to be outside, retrieving. A dog that needs EXERCISE and you have her in a gulag in a small city apartment. After years and years of being in solitary confinement with no connection to the outdoors and the smells that are essential to dogs....is it any surprise that she is pissing and shitting on her jailor???

It's a wonder that she hasn't ripped your throat out by now and I wouldn't blame her one bit. How do you stop it? Get a clue and give your dog to someone who can treat your dog as a living breathing being who deserves to be treated as something other than an accessory to your vanity or a doorstop in your life.

OK rant over about the dog.

We went on our drive. It was wonderful. From valley floor to the high timber country and back again.; 11/27/08, 6:58 PM
dualdiagnosis said...: More from wikipedia-

Although Black Friday, as the first shopping day after Thanksgiving, has served as the unofficial beginning of the Christmas season at least since the start of the modern Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1924, the term "Black Friday" has been traced back only to the 1960s.; 11/27/08, 8:17 PM
Ron said...: Yes, Darcy, I sent you an email!; 11/27/08, 8:55 PM
Cedarford said...: In a bit of good news following a terrible story, they have a suspect in the beating, then death of the Little Rock news anchor Ann Pressley last October after she lost a 5-day battle to survive.

The person arrested is some black thug with an extensive record of violent crime, as most expected.

"Curtis" is now charged with capital felony murder. Happy Thanksgiving, "Curtis"!
(Wonder if he got a nice turkey dinner from his familiar hosts at the jail??)

Defended by his relatives and the mother of his girlfriend as a "good young man", as expected. And always faithfully reported by the media any time a thug gets nailed - just how wonderful his Mamma, his GF says he is..

http://www.todaysthv.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=76412&catid=2

Interesting that AP reports that by analyzing the DNA the cops knew the type of suspect they were looking for..race, sex, likely height..

Now the formality of a trial and 15-20 years of the NYC or local chapter of the ACLU fighting to keep dear "Curtis" from expiring. Pity we don't kill 'em in a manner like they kill their victims.; 11/27/08, 9:52 PM
blogging cockroach said...: so far it s been a pretty good thanksgiving
weird but pretty good
you see mom here at the house is french
dad is american
their son tommy
whose computer i use
is very confused
that didn t stop tommy from making a very good
pumpkin pie which i just sampled yum dessert
anyway you know the french don t eat early
so mom s idea of thanksgiving dinner is 6 pm
that s super early in france
that s super crazy over here
dad says thanksgiving is the only day
the americans eat better than the frence
mom says merde
but mom did get talked into making a dinde
that s turkey in french
with the usual fixings
but how do you explain stuffing to the french
not to mention creamed onions
but mom did her best with dad s help
and it all worked out
though they got into a bit of a dustup
the biggest problem was the wine
why am i not surprised
dad had this bottle of puligny montrachet
picked out and mom says it s all wrong
dad says ok we ll drink the mondavi
you ve been cooking with if that s how
you re going to be and mom says you need
a nice cote du rhone but not chateauneuf du pape
more something like a cornas
and dad says but that s red and i drink white
wine with turkey and mom says your palate
isn t educated so go open one of those bottles of
05 cornas in the basement before the
damn dinde drys and i get angry
so they had a slightly sulkey dinner with dad
coughing and making faces at the wine
and mom reminding tommy that the pilgrims
and the indians probably didn t have any good wine
but some people never learn to appreciate such
things and it was just as well they drank
beer and dad says he could use a good beer
about now

well this went on and given the late start
and the bickering over wine things didn t wind up
until very late when it was too hard
to really clean up well which is fine by me
as you know i like to dine fashionably late too; 11/27/08, 9:58 PM
john said...: blogging coachroach said - and dad says he could use a good beer
about now

lol This dad concurs.

I hope you all had as pleasant a day as we all had at our house. Tomorrow is a different story, as the female contingent already have their Black Friday knives sharpened and are ready to Mall pounce.; 11/27/08, 10:10 PM
Janis Gore said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 11/27/08, 10:10 PM
Wince said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 11/27/08, 11:07 PM
Wince said...: Watch, as Martha Stewart "eats" a Thanksgiving turkey: Keeping the pointy wings neatly at the side.

Hey, at least Our Turkeys are Killed Humanely ! @0:35; 11/27/08, 11:30 PM