Thursday, November 25, 2010

Best holiday

As always, the excesses of Thanksgiving come through for me. I ate about six hours ago and intend never to eat again. I love cornbread dressing, maybe for the infrequency of its appearance. We have pretty much a standard meal, except for the cranberry chutney we have instead of that jellied stuff.
We have many occasions for gratitude: We stand upright and cast a shadow on days the sun shines. We have plenty of food and digest it well. There's a charming little girl churning around the house, throwing off giggles and glee. Nothing purer than the laughter of a little kid – no hip PoMo irony, no sarcasm – just unadulterated pleasure and delight in the present, emotions we olders catch only occasionally and for brief moments. We might oughta study toddlers for lessons in spontaneity.
On pleasure and delight, go here and find the magic of Israel Kamakawiwoʻole, a voice so clean it will make you all teary. Can't embed, that's disabled. Poor Bruddah Iz did himself in with Spam and excess, I believe, and it's a loss for all.
And go here a raft of reasons that vodka is 80 proof. It's fun.
Mad Mike, the Pirate King, is back in our part of the world and has bought himself a motorcycle. Sixty-year-old bones knit slowly, but he knows that.
I hope everyone in the republic had as good a day as we did.

3 comments:

Pilot said...

Was hoping that would be the version of Iz's anthem that you linked. Always hard to listen to that, to see the beauty of the islands, and keep a dry eye. 10-4 on the bones. I was tooling around the neighborhood on the old scooter when the sloppy cold front pushed through last night. Reminded me of many nights spent freezing driving my little Honda to see my high school sweetheart across that causeway to Point Comfort. Lord, the things hormones will drive a boy to do.......
These sixty year old bones are feeling the cold this morning.....

Edith Ann said...

I have to agree with your assessment of Thanksgiving. 'Excesses' is the perfect descriptor. As for myself--I know I have way more than I deserve.

The one thing we did not have this year was anything chocolate, and I am pretty sure that border on un-American or something. I contributed a decadent white chocolate cheesecake topped with homemade lemon curd, but white chocolate doesn't count.

It was a good day, Mr. Loon.

Thanks for the warning about Mad Mike. I'll keep an eye out as I travel the rounds of Calhoun County.

Sugar Magnolia said...

And a good day for us as well. As much as I like to cook, I almost outdid myself on Thanksgiving and cooked more than we could eat in a week. We eschew turkey in favor of a spiral-sliced, bone-in ham, with cornbread dressing, sweet potatoes, cranberry relish, corn, green beans, rolls. The usual. I baked coconut meringue, pecan, chocolate, and pumpkin pies, along with a cherry strudel. Let's just say I will have a lot to share at work this week and next. Oh, yeah, forgot the banana nut bread....

Oh, my poor belly. We are overly blessed. And the first REAL cold front of the season blowing through during our mealtime just made everything that much better, after having sweated in the kitchen all day. We threw the windows and doors opened and enjoyed thoroughly.

And that's what I call a day of THANKSGIVING!