Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm in a flurry of planning, hoping to try out a new creamed spinach and parsnip dressing, wondering how to talk my mother into glazing the turkey with apricot compote (for color, I hear it's fantastic), overstuffing bags in case one outfit for dinner ends up with a big fat gravy splotch on it (this is most probable of all). I'm combining friends and family this year and hope everyone is on their best behavior, but the house is full of cats and the dog and my turkey of a brother, my mother who curses if the sausage stuffing dries out, my father who inevitably has to run to the barn, last minute to secure the chair we're missing, and it's inevitably tiny, antique and iron and I have to somehow sit on it as I sip perhaps my third wine and second buttered rum of the evening.

Thanksgiving is fantastic. Especially since I just ordered these flowers as a gift to family who won't be able to join us this year. But before all of that, a manic running around the "office" to check up on freelancing possibilities. My bags are heavy but my load is light--I have my family, I have my friends, I have a bed and for the moment, I may be exceptionally underemployed, but that merely gives me more time to put a new twist on our famous cranberry walnut pie. Traditions? We have none. Just to have a good time and a good stiff drink. And to retell this story.

Sending good wishes to all of you today, may you overeat and not think about the economy for just one day...