November 25, 2007: Crump's Garden Open House
	November 3-11, 2007: A Trip to Georgia and North Carolina
	Return to Index for 2007

Thanksgiving Eve

Well, another Thanksgiving Week has rolled around and, as is my usual, I am planning to have a few friends over for the day. Tomorrow's guest list will include Fred, of course, plus our new friends Mario and Steve, our friend Lou and his friend Bill Klug and my friend Greg and his new partner, Grant.

Also as is my usual, I have scouted around to find the largest turkey I can, and I was able to find one last Saturday at Kroger that was just over 24 pounds (easily beating my sister's 16 pounds this year, but then her heart might not have been in it what with Patrick's health problems). It has been thawing in the fridge since then and, this evening, I am stuffing it ahead of time so that I won't have much to do early in the morning when I stick it in the oven.

So, I was just getting ready to unwrap the turkey and stuff it when Fred, who arrived earlier this evening from Crumps, decided to take a picture of me and the guest of honor.

Thanksgiving Day

Greg, Grant and Lou arrived early, while I was still cooking the turkey, and at left you can see Greg and Lou looking on as I perform my basting duties. Bill arrived shortly after them, and he, Greg and Grant started conversing. In my experience, guests always congregate in the kitchen, whether or not that is a place big enough to accommodate them, and you can see Greg, Bill and Grant talking together in the kitchen if you click here.

Steve and Mario had not arrived, and when I called them I found they'd had some trouble getting their squash casserole dish ready for cooking, so I told them to bring it on over and we would cook it here. Then I went back to making gravy with Bill looking on. While I was doing that, Fred and Greg and Lou and Grant were in the library doing something on the computer and talking; Fred got a good picture of Grant and Greg doing something on one of the machines. Grant is from New York, and Greg met him online some months ago. They've been long-distance dating for a while, but Grant's decided to move down here to partner up permanently with Greg.

Steve and Mario have arrived, but it appears that there will not be time to cook the squash dish, so I am going to cook it on Saturday and Steve and Mario will come back over to enjoy it. So we are getting dinner ready, and while I am finishing up making the gravy, Lou is making biscuits. The biscuits have gone into the oven and the turkey has come out, and here I am letting the turkey cool a bit before I begin to carve it.

Everything is finally coming together, and everyone is getting seated. Fred is taking this opportunity to snap a few photos of the dinner guests. To see Bill, Lou and Greg opposite and Steve and Mario from the back, click here, and for a picture of Mario, Steve and Grant opposite, click here.

Dinner went very well, and I think everyone got plenty to eat and drink. I always like to see guest enjoying themselves. Oddly enough, one of the things I, myself, enjoy doing is cleaning up afterwards.

Today, of course, is the 22nd, and tomorrow, the 23rd, is my 61st birthday, and Fred had clued everyone in about that, and almost everybody brought a card for me. So, after dinner but before dessert, we took some time so I could open my cards and pass them around for everyone to enjoy. Here's me opening cards, courtesy of Fred and his camera.

Thanksgiving 2007 was a success, I think. This will be the last Thanksgiving before Fred's impending retirement, which will be in just over two weeks.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	November 25, 2007: Crump's Garden Open House
	November 3-11, 2007: A Trip to Georgia and North Carolina
	Return to Index for 2007