The Ghost of Thanksgivings Past
5:16 p.m. - 2002-11-27


This year I am actually going to have to work a little on the great feast day because my daughter, the baker, is off to college. Naturally they did not assign me the easy things, like butter, but gave me the time-consuming baking chores, like homemade rolls and pie. The other side of the family expects rolls and deviled eggs and mashed potatoes. Good grief, I forgot to buy potatoes! Solved that problem by calling him and asking him to get some on the way home. I don't have to do EVERYTHING.

When I was small, our Thanksgivings never varied. I can't remember one time when we had anything newfangled. We always had my mom's dressing with slivered almonds in it, mashed potatoes, and the rest. It was all good, but to me, the best part was the next day when I had the turkey sandwich, in which the turkey was a condiment for the mayonnaise.

In my youth, most vacations were semi-spoiled for me by my hopeless procrastination. Instead of getting my homework out of the way right off the bat, I would put it off and put it off until the very last minute Sunday night. But it was always there, hanging over my head, dulling my enjoyment of the holiday. This poor character trait lasted until there was no more homework to put off. Graduating from college was one of the happiest days of my life.

So tonight I am starting 4 days off from work. I am not putting anything off like before, because THERE IS NO HOMEWORK!! This is, actually, why I am no longer a teacher. I am just not cut out for a job that involves homework.

I survived the end of the month namerun, though it was a close thing. I was up against the clock, with minutes to spare when I discovered a personal property lien and the only thing that saved the file from the dreaded PULL was that some clerk somewhere had entered the man's social security number in the computer, which I have never seen done before, usually the place it is supposed to be is blank, and we were able to determine that the man with the same name and same middle initial was actually not the same man in the file. So I called in the all clear two minutes before the time ran out. Whew! So I called the office and commended them, letting them know how close to the PULL they were, putting the fear into them. Maybe they will enter the info better into the computer on all the files now. Fat chance.

After that, people started bringing out the food. My goodness, they have a lot of food in my office. We had Krispy Kreme donuts, pumpkin pie, chips, wraps, and since tomorrow is Linda's birthday, a strawberry cream birthday cake.

Now I am off to Jason's to show him the pictures we took on our trip. He wants to see the pictures of our college girls.