I have to give My Dear Sweet Sainted Wife credit, she can cook up a storm. She gets a little frantic sometimes when things don't proceed exactly to plan, but this year everything went off as smooth as can be.
I did have to run down to the Dollar General for a box of toothpicks she needed to pin up her turkey (we had some, but they ran out). But that was the only single thing that went awry the whole day long, so that's a pretty well-organized Thanksgiving dinner for nine if you ask me.
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She even cooked an extra back-up turkey just for a take-home supply for everybody.
This was one of those Hays turkeys we give away for subscription renewals during the month of November ... and also give one to all our employees for a Thanksgiving gift, and every year, several hundred turkeys are part of the festivities.
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Leah-Bo and Alexandra were there, along with my Dear Sweet Sainted Mother and Carl, as well as my sister Karen and the two oldest boys, Jeff and Kit. Youngest son Zach was stuck in Austin, Texas, but he had a Thanksgiving turkey, compliments of his mother a few weeks ago when she was down there for a week-long visit, so he'll get by I guess.
Strange as it may seem with the weather as cold and windy as it was Thanksgiving Day, Jeff and Kit and I did get in our traditional 9-hole golf match, and to tell you the truth, we'd have probably played 18 if it weren't for the siren song of Thanksgiving dinner -- and a few football games to catch up on.
It was cold enough to require three levels of clothing, but with hand warmers and my Tommy Two-Glove approach it was tolerable enough. We made one birdie apiece and a variety of pars, bogeys and doubles in the nine holes, but it was still a fun hour and a half.
Golf buddy Bruce drove by and stopped on the road as we were putting out on No. 1 and asked us what the heck we thought we were doing, and we just said, "finishing up our bogey putts."
He didn't volunteer to run get his cart and join us, however.
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My Pigskin Picking is getting flaky again; I'm still in fifth place about five games back of Mark Brasfield, and I just can't seem to get a break. I am, however, an enormous 35 games ahead of Mr. Dead Last Harry Darby, so I'm pretty safe there.
Like yesterday's Ole Miss-Mississippi St. game. Naturally, I picked Ole Miss, and they managed to blow it right at the end. It was about as bad as having money on the Cowboys to cover 8 (which I didn't) but having to watch them give up a late field goal to win only by 7 (another reason I don't bet on football except maybe the Super Bowl and I always pick the underdog and lose that bet).
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Memphis looked a little better clobbering Siena on Thanksgiving Day, and maybe with another good game they can beat LSU this afternoon and earn a chance to get humiliated again by Oklahoma State in that little tournament's finals Saturday.
No, actually I expect a much better effort from them against the Cowboys this time (if it happens).
For one thing, I think Pastner is smart enough to double-team Smart and make some of those other guys beat them (which I'm sure they will). But when there's only one true NBA-type player on the court, he has to draw extra attention or he'll light you up, like he did in Stillwater.
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So now, it's on to Christmas, the shopping days for which are cut a little bit short this year because of the late-falling Thanksgiving. Maybe that's why there were more "Brown Thursday" and "Black Friday" sales around this year.
But it won't affect me any because as always, my Christmas shopping will commence on Dec. 24 (unless My Dear Sweet Sainted Wife has taken care of everything before then.)
I can only hope.
dtennyson@blythevillecourier.com