Silver Lining Saturday part XV

Welcome once again to Silver Lining Saturday - where every week, it's Thanksgiving!

okay, okay, enough of that announcer crap.

But it has been another wunnerful week, let's recap!

Well, it was Thanksgiving on Thursday, and we had a nice one here with just the 5 of us. The dysfunctions of my family-in-law do tend to be more apparent around the holidays, but we made it through this one okay. And I'm thankful that Magnum has gotten better at standing up for himself and his values, thusly elevating our black sheep status. Sheesh, talk about your silver lining hunting...

And as far as the actual Thanksgiving day goes, we had a very nice one. I cooked all the traditional stuff - it was all eaten up, and the husband and kids were genuinely appreciative. And we do have lots to be thankful for, everyone's health for example. We had a full day of playing-outside time in honor of all that good health. I think even the dog was extra thankful.

Kids were on break from school and Magnum took the week off from work. My work schedule was lighter than usual too, so we had more time for some good ol' R&R. I actually did go and see the movie "Twilight". Magnum tagged along. I warned him that the audience would probably be a bunch of 15 year-old-girls, and he had NO problem with that *rolls eyes*. We enjoyed the movie - was a nice little "escape", and I can certainly see the appeal to the teen girl crowd.

And I mentioned that our week also included a day at Memorial Park. It's nice to get away from the daily grind and just go out and play with like-minded people... like we did when we were kids... and not think about bills and government bailouts and dirty toilets and whatnot. It was a good systems flush.

Now it's the weekend, and December is upon us. I took a raucous, snowy run this morning in 24 invigorating degrees! I am thankful for my physical health, and I'm thankful that everyone returns to school and work next week (that's for my mental health).
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now we're cookin'!

AAaaaaaaaaah.... Woke up to the smell of cooking flesh this morning.

Got my turkey S-L-O-W cooking, put it in at bedtime last night. So now it's officially Thanksgiving and I'm in more of a cooking mood. We went out yesterday, got some fresh air at a local park and got rid of the domestic doldrums, so now I'm ready for some culinary adventures.

Chaco and Wolfgang cut up the park sidewalks with their rollerblades while Meego terrorized some ducks and geese for a while before hitting the playground aparati.

It was a nice day to get out. I'd been feeling a little caged with Magnum and the kids all home from work and school this week. Causing ruckuses and making messes and talking about the food they're going to eat - that just magically appears in that fantasy land of theirs. I was feeling a bit abused.


So the fresh air and people watching the park provided was a good thing. Got outside the box.

Meego successfully

and unsuccessfully hiding

from the camera.

So Happy Thanksgiving to all of my blog friends! I'm truly thankful for all of ya's!

Love and kisses,

Abby<--------- (That's webdings for "Abby". Cool that it's got 2 bicycles, no??)

Abby
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bon apetite

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving here in the U.S. The guy on the radio this morning kept referring to it as "Turkey Day" and it started to bug me.

"Here's the weather forecast for your Turkey Day".... "Here's what you should know about closures on Turkey Day".... "Our program lineup for Turkey Day is..." I don't have a problem with people who say "Happy Holidays", but c'mon. Turkey Day? He doesn't even need to say "Thanksgiving" if he doesn't want to. Just say "Thursday" or "Tomorrow", I'd be good with that, but "Turkey Day"??

I know people put much preparation into their Thanksgiving meal. I'm just cooking for the 5 of us this year, so no pressure. I made my last stop at the grocery store yesterday, and if I forgot something, well, too bad. I'm not going there today. No way.

I do like to cook. If I've got the time. And the proper equipment. And the food is interesting. And someone will actually eat it. Uhm, remember when I blogged about the Army recruiter in High School telling me I could "do anything but cook"? And remember how I'd felt a bit offended? And perplexed about how he could get that from an ASVAB test?

Truth is, deep down, I know he's right.

I see cooking as a creative activity, but I don't worry about it much. My own tastes are very simple when it comes to the actual eating part. Cooking is just a pastime - like making mud pies or paper snowflakes. I don't particularly like eating in restaurants either. It's just "recreational eating".

But I do try, most of the time, to be a healthy conscientious meal planner. Somebody's gotta do it.

I saw this meme over at Brandy101's and thought it seemed timely and worth thinking about on Thanksgiving Eve:

#1. What's the worst tasting food you've ever eaten?
Oh, GAG, that's gotta be flax seeds. I got some of those a while back because I'd heard they're supposed to be good and healthy. Thought I'd throw some in with a bowl of oatmeal. Don't do it! DON'T!! I deplore you!!! Some people offered me alternative ways to get some flax, but I just can't go back.

#2. Share a funny or embarassing story about a meal you've made.
Did you know that if you don't put enough sauce on the bottom of your casserole dish for a "quick pasta casserole", the pasta doesn't cook? At all? I do. Now.

#3. What food do you burn or have problems cooking most often?
I guess I'll go with bacon. Such fine lines there between too squishy, just right, and burnt.

#4. Name two foods you'll be eating on this Thanksgiving.
That remains to be seen. I'm planning the traditional turkey/stuffing/gravy/yams/etc. But if something gets ruined, I just don't really care enough to try to fix it. There's always peanut butter and pickle samwiches.

Thankfully.
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the last thing I said?

I was sitting in traffic yesterday.

Again.

Sitting. Inching ever so slowly forward. Stuck in a traffic jam. This was the second time in less than a week, I'm beginning to wonder what's up with that. Again, it was a bad car crash on the interstate. Are the car-crash gods following me?

Last week, I was heading home from a tutor session. Took me nearly an hour to go 5 miles. Multi-car crash. Yesterday, I was heading downtown for a different tutor session. Car had crashed into a parked semi-truck. There was a fatality. All south-bound lanes were closed. Find an alternate route.

So as I've spent an inordinate amount of time, literally just sitting, in traffic, I've been thinking of mortality. Of how short life is. I started thinking about people that probably don't know how important they are to me. What if I never saw them again?

So the car crash gods have gotten through. I've gotten the message. I'm going to be more "authentic" (pardon the Oprah-ism). I think I do okay at this, but I could be better. I gotta hand it to their timing too. Two car-crash jams in a week, my birthday right in the middle.

Oh, and we watched "Cloverfield" last weekend. A similar message there, and rather thought provoking if you can get passed the nauseating shaky camera effects. Seems to be a theme with me. Think about it. What if YOUR city and friends were eaten by a big monster? Do they know how you really feel about them? Better tell 'em!
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Silver Lining Saturday, part XIV

Welcome to this week's episode of Silver Lining Saturday!

For one thing, yes, yesterday was my birthday. I don't really make a big deal about my own birthday anymore. Once you can drink, drive, and vote (preferrably not all at once), what's the dif? And, definitely, once one becomes a mom, one's own birthday pretty much takes on the same priority as waxing the lawnmower. BUT, it's still nice to have people say a heartfelt, "Happy Birthday!", and I did get some of those... after a bit of prompting.

On that note, there was the Neighbor Flanders lunch. I told her that I would be "in and out" a lot on Friday. Upon arriving in after a particular out, I found a message from her on my answering machine informing me that she would be delivering my lunch in about a half an hour. The call had come in about a half an hour prior, so I braced myself for impact. She arrived a few minutes later armed with a takeout bag from Zio's Italian Kitchen, complete with salad, entree, roll, drink, cake, packet of plasticware, and personalized birthday card. I felt horribly guilty that she had done this after all the work I put into avoiding her. She assured me that she "just wanted to", and I suppose I should be thankful for her thinking of me, silver lining that it is.

And on the food frenzy theme, the Thanksgiving Feast at the elementary school was a fun success. Coincidentally, I did, in fact, have mashed potato duty (looks around, paranoidly wondering if any school peeps read this blog), gravy too - a double dipper! There was a very large turnout of parents, and we could hardly scoop fast enough to keep up. I served with some fun moms, and I didn't have to cook anything nor clean up!

I'm thankful that my flexible work schedule allows me to do this school volunteering stuff while still having a job that I find fun and rewarding. One of my tutor students informed me that he scored well on the test that we had prepared for. He's happy. Mom's happy. Everybody's happy.

We won the office football pool again at Magnum's work. I don't remember how many weeks we've won, but we've actually got a pretty decent record going. We do our picks together as a family, and the kids get a share of the pot if we win - gotta get that gambling ethic instilled early. Plus, it provides a good outlet for Magnum's competetive nature and keeps him from griping (too much) about the government.
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corn of plenty

I'll be heading out in a little while to go to the Thanksgiving Feast at Meego's school. Yep, they pull out all the stops - set up a full buffet line, complete with whole roasted turkeys (not the wonderful "turkey loaf" with fluorescent green gravy we all remember and love from our own school cafeteria days). As a PTO SUCKER... er... volunteer, I get to work the serving line.

It's actually quite fun. Most of the kids get all dressed up and their parents come in to eat with them, also all dressed up. Meego is wearing a pair of camo cargo shorts and an nondescript t-shirt, his typical M.O. He's not a real dress-up kind of guy, and I figure that's one battle I don't need to pick.

Me, I'll break out the girl clothes for the occassion - being a server and all. Last year, I was corn. Maybe this year, I'll be qualified to move up to mashed potatoes. We'll see. Just don't make me carve. Sterno fumes and sharp objects are not a good mix for me.

AND, this feast duty thing serves as excuse #4 as to why I won't do lunch with Neighbor Flanders. I appreciate everyone's advice on my Neighbor Flanders dilemma, but despite the potential for colorful blog entries, I'm going to continue my evasion tactics. To those who have said, "G'head! who knows? You might have fun!" - thing is, I HAVE. I tried saying yes to her invites early on and that's how I KNOW this would be a Lunch of Eternity, and I don't mean that in a good way.

So, off I go to sling some public school Thanksgiving hash. May the sterno fumes be wafting a-plenty!
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hold the guacamole

Well, what a good class we have here! So knowledgeable of your SOHCAHTOA's and PEMDAS's and FANBOYS's. And extra credit for Jerry for remembering FOIL for expanding the quadratic, and I'm rather curious as to what MYLEGS refers to.

Let me just say that I don't remember EVER being taught any of those mnemonics or whatevers when I was in school. We just learned the stuff the old boring way. I do remember a little ditty a friend of mine from the Catholic school told me for remembering the order of planets in our solar system, but that's it.

I'm thinking I should give prizes to those who were the first to give such good answers, but I'm not sure what to award. Maybe later, I'll rummage through our own little Land of Misfit Toys.

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Now, on to a little dilemma. Okay, so some of you know of Neighbor Flanders. For those who don't, a little recap. Neighbor Flanders is my (surprise!) neighbor. She lives across the street. Ever since we moved here 4 years ago, she's been trying to get me to do stuff with her - to build up to this best neighbor buddy thing. I don't want to be best neighbor buddies with Neighbor Flanders.

She's not a bad person or anything, and on the surface, we have lots in common. For lack of a better explanation, I can only say that I just don't feel that she and I are "compatible" with each other. I JUST FIND HER A LITTLE STRANGE, OKAY? I just can't bring myself to just tell her that I don't want to do stuff with her. I get out of her invitations by siting a conflict of schedule or some such. And she just hasn't seemed to be getting the hint! PART OF HER STRANGENESS, I THINK.

She hadn't called me in a while, so I was thinking that maybe she was finally getting it. But NO. Yesterday, she called. She wants to take me to lunch for my birthday that's coming up. UGH!! Now, I know what you're thinking! Just go out to lunch with her already, how bad could it be? OH, it could be bad. AND, I've found that saying yes to her only eggs her on to request MORE!!

Anyway, I told her that I just have a really busy week, and Magnum is out of town for a few days - all true. But the truth is, if it was a friend that I actually wanted to have lunch with, I could've found the time.

Certainly there are worse dilemmas, but this has been ongoing for 4 years, and I feel a bit frustrated. And now she says she's going to MAKE me a lunch and just bring it over. Guilt GUILT!!

I think of myself as a very what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person - don't have much problem being honest with people, but this Neighbor Flanders thing puzzles me. Fiddlesticks and Shaving cream! (I gave up cussing, remember?)

Just venting. In the meantime, I'll let you know what she makes for lunch *sigh*.
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