Happy New Year!

I know the iPhone pic isn’t great, but it should give you an idea. They reside to the right of our fridge (for anyone who’s ben to the house). Now, I’m all ready to buy myself that slow cooker!

All was well until some of our friends asked what we were doing for Turkey Day. We’ve become known for hosting our version of Thanksgivng and apparently it’s more famous than we even knew. One friend was even using this as an opportunity to introduce us t his new boyfriend from out of state. With people traveling hundreds of miles we couldn’t back out. Of course, Thanksgiving In a Box is always an option, but we knew this year we had to up our game.

After some discussion, Kristy and I came to the conclusion there was no way we could eat a Thanksgiving dinner only to turn around and make another. After all, most people can barely eat one and with only half a day to cook, we weren’t keen on starting late either. Besides, the second half of Thanksgiving (for us non-football fans) should be dedicated to holiday libations, not sweating it out in the kitchen.

Enter, Mini-Thanksgiving. We set out to see if we could boil this silly holiday down to it’s core. Thanksgiving is all about the food, so we thought, what if you ould get all the tastes in one bite? Much like the well loved Thanksgiving Sandwich Jim and I used to enjoy, this meal would be all flavor, no dishes.

The core of the Thanksgiving meal, we decided, was 4 fold: Turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and potatoes. Of course every family has their variations. For some there are mashed potatoes and yams, others may require a specific gravy or bread recipe, and still more insist the wretched green bean casserole be included. However, no matter where you look, those four things show up in some capacity. So last night we set out to do a practice run on our new idea. With a little creativity, we were able to double down in some places and even give it a some snooty names, ushering in a new era of Thanksgiving mockery.

Main course: Roasted turkey and whipped sweet potato puree on mini-toast with a cranberry chutney and celery veloute sauce.

Drink pairing: A dirty martini (there are actually drink choices including spiced rum and cider and some cranberry thing we didn’t quite nail)

And for dessert: Organic pumpkin micro-pies with “synthetic vanilla foam” (read: Cool Whip). To drink, the Eggbeater from Mr. Boston (eggnog, coffee liquor and spiced rum).

So this year, I give thanks to all of you out there who have ever embraced an alternative Thanksgiving with me, anyone who’s taken the time to make a home cooked meal, and most importantly to all of my family who taught me cooking can be fun, easy and not require clean up.

We’ll let you know how it goes over on the real event Thursday!

Here are their original mug shots from the day we got them:

Then they grew into  these two fine specimiens:

Alas, for animals, birthdays don’t come with as much fun. For Lou and Tildie, they ot a trip to the vet.

Lou is in cat prison after breaking out of his harness. Their birthday present was a new set of cat carriers.

Lou weighed in at 12 lbs 9 Ounces, and Tildie a much trimmer 8 lbs 8 ounces. Overall, they were given a clean bill of health!

“Hi Drew I called because I want to talk to you about a few things. Please call me back when you get a chance.”

Not to sound snide, but as it turns out, that’s the whole purpose of the telephone: to talk. If you called me, I would imagine you had something you wanted to talk about otherwise it would be a waste of time for both of us. It’s one thing to leave a message with your contact information (especially if I don’t know you or the purpose of the call was to make an introduction), but it’s another to simply leave a voicemail to declare the presence of the call. To me this broadcasts two things:

1) You don’t really care about my time. After all, you’re putting the responsibility of the call on me (not to mention putting me in the position of having to make a call with no purpose) and you’ve just wasted a small amount of my time with your uninformative voicemail.

2) You’re hiding something. We both know you had a reason. Call me paraniod, but the fact that you won’t lay it out in my voice mail makes me suspicious.

So what do you do if the subject is sensitive, complicated, or you don’t want to leave it on a voicemail? Leave an idea. In the same way that text messages are great for short snippets to set something up, a voice mail can prep the recipient and make the actual conversation more useful. If your topic is ultra sensitive, chances are you weren’t going to say it on the phone anyway, so focus on what you’re doing. Ask to set up a meeting and get back to you with available times.

Of course, there’s also always the option to not leave a message. I realize in today’s world most of the time making a call leaves traces, like caller ID, that can leave the recipient wondering, but that’s more efficient than making me call voice mail to hear you announce the same thing caller ID said. If I’m curious, I’ll call you back. If I’m not, you should be ready to call me.

In the end, an uninformative voice mail makes you look ill informed yourself and doesn’t help us get anything done. After all, you wouldn’t send an email that read “Hi Drew, I just wanted to email you and say I need to email you.”

A while back I wrote a post and used the phrase “a spoon full of sugar” in the title. Mine was a reference to something entirely different, but surprisingly to me I found a lot of users trying to find the lyrics to that song coming from search engines. While there are probably plenty of places to find this, I took a minute to transcribe the lyrics from the movie version and place them here for anyone searching. Enjoy!

To set the scene… Mary, Jane and Michael are about to clean the children’s room. Mary claims it’s a game. The game, of course is “Well Begun is Half Done”.

Jane (speaking): It is a game isn’t it Mary Poppins?

Mary Poppins (speaking) : Well, it depends on your point of view. You see…

(kinda, sing-speaking)In every job that must be done
There is an element of fun
You find the fun and snap!
The job’s a game

(now singing)
And every task you undertake
Becomes a piece of cake
A lark! A spree! It’s very clear to see that…

A Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
The medicine go down
The medicine go down
Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
In a most delightful way

(Robin starts Whistling)

A robin feathering his nest
Has very little time to rest
While gathering his bits of twine and twig
Though quite intent in his pursuit
He has a merry tune to toot
He knows a song will move the job along

(Robin whistles a bit with Mary)

For a Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
The medicine go down
Medicine go down
Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
In a most delightful way

[Interlude where all the toys go about putting themselves away as the children snap and the Robin whistles away. This is perhaps the longest part of the song and always makes me think the song is longer than it really is]

The honey bees that fetch the nectar
From the flowers to the comb
Never tire of ever buzzing to and fro
Because they take a little nip
From every flower that they sip
And hence (Mary’s reflection echoes: And hence),
They find (Mary’s reflection echoes: They find)
(together) Their task is not a grind.

(the reflection alone) Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
(Mary spoken to the mirror) Cheeky! (now to the children) Don’t be all day about it please

Michael (yelling from inside the closet): Let me out! Let me out!

Mary (spoken to the toys): Well, that was very… Thank you now… Will you quite finish! Thank you.

And that’s it. If you’d like to view the song, you can find Julie Andrews singing it for real over on YouTube.

(for my non-search friends, this is called “Google bombing” and is the same technique that ranked the president’s bio for “miserable failure” and a different spoof page for “french military victories”.)