Thanksgiving Preparations

 

Well Mommy's famous (and quite fabulous!) turkey head is waiting for a pineapple. In the meantime, the handbag that Bob fashioned for me from a log will do nicely! I think my sister Cathy said she's providing the pineapple... (*1)

So here are a couple of helpful suggestions to make your holiday entertaining that much easier. First off, don't clean the house too early. Like I'm talking wait until the last minute if possible.

Case in point: this floor was clean... maybe yesterday? But we're heavy traffic: bringing in autumn leaves and general dirt on our boots type people so I learned the hard way to clean at the last minute or have to do it all over. Hell! I've got more important things to do with my time! (Like play outside and track in more dirt!) (*2)

And here's another tip: no matter what they tell you on the packaging or the Internet, your frozen turkey will still be frozen after many days of refrigerator thawing!

Here's Bob attempting to wrestle guts from our 13 pound friend. What do you do when you get one of those 20 pound behemoths?!?! Anyway, I'm certain that tragedy will be averted, the bird will thaw and a lovely golden brown turkey will grace the table tomorrow.  But now I have to go clean!!

(*1) I sorta forgot to buy one, along with dish soap. Yes, several trips to various stores and I forgot. I guess we'll have to dine on dirty platters and grubby, reused stemware! The horrors!

(*2) Similar to the time I bought and wrapped a birthday present for a friend. Several months passed before seeing this friend, in which time the wrapping paper was a crumpled, dirty mess and I had to re-wrap it. 

Thankful Rita (*1)

 

So I have successfully located Mommy's famous turkey head centerpiece again this year! Of course, I forgot to procure a pineapple, so this year it's installed on a log. The mini squashes are from our garden, and the brand new blue tablecloth is on its virgin voyage; thank you to Beatrice and John for Bob's birthday gift! It will be gravy and cranberry stained by day's end.

What am I thankful for this year?!??! Fuck 2020! It's almost (thankfully!!) over... hooray!

Let's see: I know I'm thankful for Bob; a heckuva guy. He fixed the barn roof recently, finishing up while recovering from an eye procedure- service above and beyond the call of duty. He (as we all know) is a great sculptor and a fun guy to have around. (He also doesn't lose it when I do things like buy a new horse. Gotta be grateful for that!)

I'm thankful every minute of every day for Robin the Good. A splendid friend and a wonderful dog. (She asks, "What's a "dog"?!?") My partner in gardening and studio time and pretty much everything else. My little shadow...

I think I'm grateful for having two horses. Sometimes they can be a pain in the ass like when they want to kill each other when food is involved... like all the time (so much for peaceful herd animals!) But in general, Maggie and Neko are entertaining and I can ride one of them. (Maggie is amused by my requiring Neko to do weird stuff; she watches us in the round pen and laughs.)

I'm thankful that I have a nice family, even if I didn't get to see them this Thanksgiving. Hello Cathy! Hello Beatrice! Hello John! Maybe next year? I promise to get a pineapple for the turkey head. (And John: I especially miss that cranberry sauce you make!! A tragedy to be without it!)

I'm grateful for all our wonderful friends. We may not be able to visit in person now that the weather is colder, but at least making contact on the phone is a good thing. It's good to know they're out there.

I'm so existentially glad that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the election that I cannot say anything else without stumbling all over myself and becoming redundant. Thank you to all 70+ million Americans who voted for them. Democracy lives!

I guess I'd also have to admit to being thankful that we haven't contracted COVID 19. So many people have died and I go back to my previous statement that 2020 pretty much sucked. 

Onward and upwards as we hurtle towards a new year!

(*1) I am making a sideways reference to the "Thankful Arnold House" in Haddam, Connecticut. Bob and I have never been but pass the sign occasionally and say to one another, "Wonder what that's all about? We'll have to go sometime." I used think that that was some guy's name- "Thankful Arnold" but after visiting their website, I found out Thankful was a woman's first name and Arnold was her last name. Here's the link; they have an exhaustive section about outhouses from those times. Exciting!

Thnakful Arnold House

 

Catching Up With the Natural World

While the weather wasn't anywhere nearly as dire as predicted, there was still a lot of rain. Our stream actually played at featuring a waterfall. Bob has been dragging old logs out of the stream and rearranging some larger stones to create a walk way bridge (in place of the metal ladder than inelegantly straddles he stream now). But the stream had other ideas this morning and bolstered by the rains of last night, there was a respectable rushing and swelling of foamy white caps as it over topped the wall. The stream has been low this year, so this was a nice change. Very dramatic!
Here's another shot, further down stream, with a much wider channel than is typical:

It's funny. I spend more time with our stream further up the road on my morning walk. Bob's studio is right near this part of the stream, so he checks on it every day and reports to me on what's up with the wonderful world of water.
Both Jules and Maggie were outside today far more than I wanted to be, I kept visiting Maggie and offering her nice dry hay in her nice dry barn, but she wanted to eat and run outside. And roll. She now resembles a large chocolate covered turtle. It will be loads of fun trying to clean her off tomorrow morning! She had leaves and twigs in her mane and tail and looked like a woodland sprite. A fine mess!

Yes, that's hay in her forelock. She enjoys pulling her hay out of the rack, tossing it in the air and wearing half of it. What a gal!
And not to be outdone, Jules moved just as I was taking his picture, so here he is: very wet and for some reason his tongue is sticking out. (Or maybe that's one of his pink and white balls that got run over by the lawn mower. Whatever.) He also smelled like the proverbial "wet dog".

Not a nice day for pictures! No one looked their best; I'm certain I didn't. But here's one more picture for good measure, referencing the previous post about what we stick in our mouths:

Doesn't look so great now, does it? Just something about raw meat... but just wait until Bob cooks it!