[Sca-cooks] Thanksgiving

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach lilinah at earthlink.net:
>My mom alternates hosting Thanksgiving with my brother's in-laws who
>have nothing special, just the usual and while not bad, nothing is
>outstanding. My mom can't cook for the family anymore - she hasn't
>for years - she is physically not up to it - so she just took us all
>out to an expensive restaurant.
>
>This year my mother has hired someone to cook, so i suppose it will
>be as close to what she used to cook as possible. Another boring
>typical Thanksgiving. My mom likes things *her* way, so whenever i
>try to help or bring something that actually is interesting to eat, i
>get yelled at or my food gets sneered at.

Oh, gawrsh. This sounds like it could be trying. Interesting, though.
I think there's some validity to the idea that people like things a
certain way, and sometimes it has nothing to do with quality. (And
sometimes quality is a huge issue.) A couple of years ago, my Mom,
who is known in the family as The Tyrant of the Kitchen -- imagine my
sense of honor upon the official pronouncement by the old lady that I
was the Designated Tyrant this year -- experimented with the idea of
having Thanksgiving dinner catered in a slightly industrialized
fashion. I think it was the deli section of one of the local
supermarkets, and they provided all the standard schtuff, and, well,
none of it was awful, but none of it was really good, either. It
wasn't hospital food or anything, it was just... well... kind of
dull. Now I'm sure there were some very specific areas in which that
meal could have been improved (and I could probably tick them off on
my fingers, too), but I think for most of us, the real problem was
that it was _different_.

>Sigh. And frankly, the company (other than my daughter) does not
>redeem the food. So, i'm off to torture at the hands of seven other
>people who have little in common with each other and 4 of whom have
>nothing but some genes in common with me (again not counting my
>daughter, whose company i enjoy).
>
>I'd rather be reading e-mail from all of you about what you're eating
>for Thanksgiving :-)

Obviously, there's only one thing to do! ;-) I've only done this
before in extreme emergencies, but I will pass on to you my Sovereign
Remedy, in hopes that it may help. Either that, or it'll give you a
chuckle because it's pretty ridiculous.

1. Buy a copy of The Weekly World News. The Enquirer, Globe, or Star
might do in a pinch (some people swear by the New York Post, but I
wouldn't want it around while people are trying to eat), but the WWN
seems to be the best, with more alien sightings, 400-lb babies,
Bat-Boy, and alien visits to the White House per page than any of the
others. And then there's always the provocative and compelling "My
America" by Ed Anger.

2. Slip/tease the pages apart, using each for a place mat.

3. Whenever there is a lull in the conversation, you can begin to
read, out loud, articles from your own page, ["Now, _here's_
something interesting!"] about how Elvis was spotted working bagging
groceries in a Safeway in Des Moines, Iowa. Then when you run out of
page/story, you politely ask who has the continuation of the story on
Page 12, and ask them to read it. Caution your fellow diners not to
spill gravy on the page about Roger Clinton being Bigfoot's Love
Slave, or the article about the amazing Cream Puff Diet, before you
can get to it.

4. Be amazed at how many civilized, otherwise sophisticated people
you can actually lure into engaging in this practice.

Adamantius,

who once got away with doing this to chief librarians from five
different prestigious universities, four visiting Russian chemists
(who wanted to know if this was a common American custom), and one
USAF colonel, all at the same table, at the same time...