Need a laugh?

[Guest guest]

With my CM and shunt, my memory shut down until recently. I remember

this and thought I would share.

The house we lived in had an attached carport. Ours was not a place

for the car, however, it was paneled in half way up the bottom with

screening on top. It housed our picnic table, which we used quite

often during the summer months.

This Thanksgiving, mom decided she would bake the turkey and not her

mom. Grandma would bring all the trimmings this year. I think mom was

trying to impress grandma. My grandmother was an excellent southern

cook, being from Alabama, and a fine reserved, gentle woman. Whenever

we went to visit her, it was like Thanksgiving lunch. She would have

the ham, mashed potatos, homemade rolls, gravy, etc. She would always

have this glass dish that was partitioned into five sections where

she would put her homemade pickels, sweet and sour, gerkins,

watermelon, dill, and sweet.

It was Thanksgiving morning and we kids and dad were slowly waking

up. We heard this scream that would curdle milk, come from the

carport. We ran to see what was going on. Mom had put the turkey on

the picnic table to cool before carving it. But now it was on the

floor, wings sticking up, legs sticking out and our dog with his

snout right in the middle having a wonderful breakfast.

We cleaned up the turkey, mom couldn't do it after all her basting

labors.

Grandma and grandpa showed up with their car full of Thanksgiving

food. We helped to bring it into the kitchen.

It was time for lunch. The table was covered with the linen table

cloth that only came out of hiding on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Grandma was busy putting her trimmings on the table. The dressing

always had its prominent spot next to where the turkey went, which

was blank this year. Next came the gravy boat. Except there were no

giblets in the gravy, the dog ate those. That was a good thing, I

never did like giblets. So the gravy this year did not have any lumpy

things. She would put out the harvard beets, the mashed potatos,

homemade rolls, creamed peas with pearl onions, succotash (corn and

butter beans), and prominantly in the middle of the table was her

sectioned glass dish with homemade pickles.

This was the fifties, we had blue laws in place and there was no Wal-

Mart. Nothing was open, this was Thanksgiving day, a holiday when

people stayed home with their families. If you needed anything, you

improvised.

With everything on the table, we all found our place. This is when we

waited for the turkey to make its grand entrance. Mom came in with a

plate of steaming hot dogs, no buns.