Tag: Thanksgiving

Britain, Expat, Friday, Humor, Links, London, Weekend

Friday Links (Black Friday Edition)

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.”
-Oprah Winfrey

Happy Thanksgiving weekend, ducklings! Jeff and I finally made it to The Mayflower for Thanksgiving dinner, and it was about as charming a British pub as you could find anywhere. In less happy news, Black Friday has crossed the Atlantic in all its greedy glory. I like a deal as much as the next kid but I can’t say I like this development.

2014-11-27 20.14.00

Of all the things for us to export culturally, it had to be this thing…

For my next gala event, I think I shall require tiaras. With bonus points for unusual ones.

Know your consumption, and it’s effects, I suppose.

One writer tells of their experience sending celebrities fan mail, and who wrote back. I wrote to President Clinton as a little girl and got a note back on White House stationary that was QUITE impressive at show and tell.

Interesting piece from Business Insider about the two traits found in successful relationships and why.

Our taxi drivers put those of any other metropolis to shame. I will fight anyone who says different.

Trigger warning, this story is about sexual brutality towards children. But it’s an important read to know what women and girls are up against in some corners of the world. And the last two sentences will get you right in the gut.

Simplistic, but more or less spot on, I think. (Can’t stop chortling over the, “Guys….”)

Long live English.

Step into a cookbook editor’s kitchen.

How do you not know that you have one of these?!

Friends, Holidays, Humor

Emails With Friends: Meta Thanksgiving is Meta

“How goes your week of not observing thanksgiving due to living under the oppressive rule of the tyrannical Queen Elizabeth II?”
“Ahem. I am partaking of Thanksgiving dinner this year at a pub called The Mayflower, situated near the site where the Mayflower ship was originally moored before setting off to the Netherlands and then New World, and across the street from the church where the Captain of the Mayflower is buried. Why, what tawdry, subpar festivities are you enjoying?”
“That’s awesome! I’m just taking a bunch of Raleigh Tavern pies over the river and through the woods to the family dinner…going to avoid the kitchen since that one time I made a turkey. I also made an oven fire (which was, however, my roommate’s fault).”
“Last year I had takeaway curry.”
– Katarina and C.

Family, Holidays, Humor, Movies, Shopping, Work

How I Spent My Thanksgiving Holiday

 “Holidays – have no pity.”
– Eugenio Montale

Wednesday – I had work, J. didn’t have school.  Bitter.  I spent the afternoon making party favors for the department Christmas party and curling ribbon until my fingers were numb.

Thursday – Meet up with Fairy, Brando, Drill, Trixie, and others at that bastion of Americana, Chuck-a-Rama for cheap, easy food that we don’t have to clean up after.  Then back to godparents’ house for a rousing game of Rummikub and phone call from parents.

Friday – C. goes shopping (although NOT at 3am like the intrepid GS and GBIL…she waits until 10 and then hits the GAP and a couple unnamed stores for Christmas shopping).  Then she and J. group with everyone again to go to a movie.

Saturday – runs errands and finishes off the evening with The Football Game in which her team beats their hated rivals.  At some point during the celebrations, C. smacks her leg against the bleachers and obtains a nasty black and blue mark that she doesn’t notice until the next morning, so high is she from the euphoria.

Sunday – sleep in.

Small Dog does not enjoy going back to work after four days of indulgence.

Holidays, as nice as they are, have one horrible symptom: the reality check at the end.  Four days free of work means that all the industrious little habits one has get unceremoniously kicked out the window and waking up Monday morning is a chore.  I barely got in a shower before we had to dash out the door and didn’t have time to wash my hair.  Not the best way to kick off the busiest time of the year, at work and otherwise!

Family, Holidays, Humor, Marriage

Turkey Day

“Thanksgiving is, after all, a word of action.”
– W. J. Cameron

Small Dog's first married Thanksgiving. Aw...

My immediate family has always been rather insular, we live far away from my extended family and haven’t always had the best relationship with them anyway.  So holidays have mostly been just us and I’ve always liked them that way: smaller, inundated with our own bizarre traditions (I think I’ll discuss some of our more quirky holiday habits at length later), and just plain cozy. 

And then I married the youngest of five children (three others of whom are married with kids of their own) whose parents live nearby and who like to get everyone together on holidays. 

So yesterday when we had our first faux-Thanksgiving (another one with godfamily may or may not be forthcoming…they haven’t celebrated a holiday on its designated day for some years now, thanks to Drill’s work schedule.  Who knows?  Maybe we’ll just eat pie and go to a movie!) because Darling and Atticus are going out of town this week, it was quite the event!  Four kids, two babies, eight adults, three ovens, two dozen rolls (not enough!), four pounds of yams (barely enough), one turkey, approximately four million toys all over the kitchen floor, and one minor blizzard.

Do not stand in the way of hungry nieces and nephews.

Absolute madness!  In a fun way.  I met J.’s oldest brother and sister-in-law for the second time (first time was at the wedding) and tricked their baby into liking me.  My brother-in-law misunderstood instructions and dumped a bunch of boiled potatoes onto the counter instead of mashing them up and then took a picture of his baby’s new trick of grabbing onto things (I taught him!).  Unfortunately, baby was grabbing onto my necklace and the camera was perfectly angled down my shirt.  The kids had already eaten a bunch of the rolls before dinner even started and then spent a good chunk of the time crawling around under the table as we adults tucked into turkey.  Afterwards they disappeared upstairs for a while only to return shrieking and pasting post-it notes over everything and everyone in reach and one of the boys punched the other in the face.

Aunt C. is becoming acclimated.