Happy Thanksgiving 2017

Happy Thanksgiving from our family to yours! (Yes, I'm in the U.S. for the holidays.)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving

Last Thanksgiving, I was at the doctor's office getting an I.V. and fighting a bad lung infection, so it didn't take much for this Thanksgiving to be a whole lot better.

As you can see, I went all out on Thanksgiving decorations. I am one step up from pathetic.

I figured watching Christmas movies would be a good start to the day. So I watched "A Christmas Story" which I dug out of my cabinet. I watched it on my VCR, because it is a VHS tape. It was pretty grainy, but fun.

I first saw this movie at the movie theater in 1983, at Seminary South Mall Theater in Fort Worth. I went with my brother and a dorm friend from grad school named Connie. We knew nothing about the movie, and after the first five minutes we discussed leaving. It looked really boring. We'd already paid for our tickets though, so we stuck it out. By the time it was over we were crying and laughing hysterically. It has since become an American modern Christmas classic. I enjoyed watching the movie today and being reminded of when childhood was a simpler thing than it is in our electronic times.

 And then I made some pumpkin bread. It made a big mess in my small kitchen.

Then I wrapped them as gifts. (Just because I am eating gluten-free and sugar-free, doesn't mean the rest of the world has to.)

Also today I talked with my parents on Skype, gave my dog a bath out of necessity, and had a new office chair delivered to me. It's not a holiday here, so I wasn't ruining anyone's holiday by making them deliver my chair to me.

A random Thanksgiving memory:
In second grade I was in a play that we performed for other classes including 6th graders. I was either Prudence, Constance or Patience; one of those weird Pilgrim names. Only seven of us were chosen for this play, because we always finished our work early and the teacher had to give us something to do so we wouldn't be bored.

Ya'll have fun eating turkey and watching football!

OH! I almost forgot to tell you that I had a turkey meal with 16 American friends (10 adults, 6 kids) last Sunday. Several adults had to work on Thanksgiving Day, so we gathered on the weekend. So no need to feel too sorry for me or anything!

My favorite holiday here

It's just like Thanksgiving!

Without the pilgrims. Or the gratitude. Or the turkey and dressing.

Okay, never mind, it's nothing like Thanksgiving.

Except it does fall on a Thursday this year.

It's Mid-Autumn Festival this Thursday, the 19th. The weather is crisp and cool, and people all head home for a big meal (ah, finally, that part sounds familiar). Then after dinner, the tradition is to sit outside or take a walk under the big bright full moon and eat mooncakes (pictured). Besides Chinese New Year, this is the most important holiday on their calendar.

The mooncakes have the consistency of American-style fruitcakes, but the fillings tend to be more nutty and creamy than fruitcakes. (I don't love mooncakes, but they are lots better than American Christmas fruitcakes in my opinion.) I had a mooncake yesterday with coconut filling, so now for the first time ever, I can truly say I like a mooncake. People stand in long lines outside this particular mooncake bakery to buy the tasty treats.

I gave a box of these yummy mooncakes to my Chinese friends Hank* and Luella* yesterday; they were pretty excited to get some without having to wait in line. Please keep their family in your prayers as Hank faces an uphill battle against the beast known as pancreatic cancer. Pray they will have a sweet holiday time together.

Black Friday

Friday, I finished my abbreviated nebulizer treatments at noon. I decided that since I hadn't had turkey for Thanksgiving, I would go to Subway sandwich shop and have a turkey sandwich. 

So that's what I did. While sitting there having lunch, it dawned upon me that I was in a mall, a really nice one, and it was Black Friday. So although I needed to be in bed, I decided a walk around the mall might just lift my spirits. It did! 

Since neither Christmas, Thanksgiving, nor therefore Black Friday are celebrated in this country, the mall was pretty empty. I looked around, bought a few items, and returned home. 

The only super-crowded place at the mall on this cold, rainy day was Starbucks, so I gave it a pass just this once.

I was so happy to be out and about on Black Friday. It's a much safer thing to do here than in America!

P.S. I have no idea what a ship has to do with Christmas. See the anchors mixed in with the snowflakes hanging from the ceiling? Anyway, it was pretty.

Thanksgiving

Due to illness, all Thanksgiving fun would be cancelled for this year. I told myself, "let's just get to breathing normally again, and then we'll have something to be thankful for later." I don't often talk to myself, but this week it just seemed like the thing to do.

Thanksgiving would be the longest day at the doctor's office. I'm sure my doctor had no idea it was Thanksgiving, seeing as how he is not an American and studied in the UK. He did two nebulizer treatments and an IV treatment before lunch, and asked me to come back mid-afternoon for another before I returned to my home across town (in the cold rain).

So for lunch, I walked a few doors down and had Thanksgiving lunch. Seeing as how I had plans to microwave a frozen burrito for Thanksgiving lunch, this was definitely a step up. I had pan-fried salmon with mashed potatoes and grilled veggies, washed down with an ice-cold Coke. 

Three Chinese men were at one table, with the boss loudly reaming out two of his silent employees.

Four European men sat at another table, cussing like sailors. I wanted to ask them to quit using that four-letter word that was ruining my holiday. But their food came, they started eating, and their conversation slowed down enough to spare my ears.

Apparently all the Americans in town were at home today.

With time to kill, and with a need to get into a place that was slightly less drafty than the restaurant, I went a few more doors down to Starbucks. I was about to sit down with my soy latte when I realized that I should really celebrate and get a manicure! The manicure place is right next door to the doctor's office, in one of the most beautiful nail salons I have ever seen in my life. (It is like a spa, decorated zen-style, with bamboo, stones, sandalwood aromatherapy, and more.) I took my coffee with me and got a manicure.

Then it was time for my 3rd nebulization of the day. After it ended, I told my doctor that it was an unusual but memorable Thanksgiving, and I was thankful for their clinic.

Because if not for their clinic, the Chinese hospital was the only other option, and if that didn't work, emergency air lift to another place would have been the only other option. And this is the fear that people who live in more remote places than me live with. (If this had happened when I lived in Bedrock, it would have been a nightmare.)

So, dear doctor, I don't know much about you or why God brought you young Singaporean doctors here when your own country is so nice. I don't know what you believe, although I heard at least one of you is a Buddhist. But I think you are tools in the hands of God, and I hope someday soon He blesses you with a relationship with Him.

Weathering a storm

I'm sick with bronchitis. I must have never had it before, because I've never heard weird noises coming from my lungs before. I'll tell you more about it later, but suffice it to say that it has stopped my regular life since it came along last Friday. There's no cooking going on at my place this week, so the Meems and I are just eating whatever packaged food we can find. Mimi picked up some tortilla chips and ate about seven of them this afternoon. I'm considering heating a burrito in the microwave for Thanskgiving dinner. I know! I was so excited to see that the import grocery store had some, otherwise I'd have to eat something boring like cereal.

(I was invited to a gathering of American friends, but the only place I am fit to go to in this condition is the doctor's office.) 

It's also cold and raining non-stop, great weather for bronchitis. Mimi and I are couch potatoes, having a NCIS marathon.

I would really appreciate your prayers, because I need this lung problem to go away soon. I've got things to do, places to go, people to see!

Thanksgiving Day

The sun shone down on this cool, crisp day, making it perfect Thanksgiving weather. I made a tossed salad and eggplant casserole before taking a taxi across town to join my American friends for a Thanksgiving lunch feast. Seventeen of us had deep-fried turkey with all the trimmings. It was a nice day and really felt like Thanksgiving.

On the way back to my place in a taxi, I saw men putting down new sidewalks, and thought what a shame it was that they had to work on Thanksgiving Day. Then I got jolted back to reality. Today's Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday. It's not celebrated in the Middle Kingdom. I had a great holiday anyway.

Thanksgiving Holidays of the past

In 1969, I looked out the wide-slat blinds in my bedroom early on Thanksgiving morning in Fort Stockton, Texas, and told my mother, "I wish it would snow." But it was sunny, probably around 80 degrees Fahrenheit, so my mom told me not to get my hopes up.

Imagine her surprise when, a few hours later, the skies opened up and sent a blanket of snow to the west Texas desert. Being with my family that day made for one of the most memorable Thanksgivings ever.

When I was in either junior high or high school, my dad and brothers went deer hunting the day after Thanksgiving, so my mom and I went an hour and a half away to Odessa, Texas, to go shopping at the mall, buy a Christmas tree that we put in the trunk of the car, and eat at Manuel's Mexican food restaurant. That was a really fun day for me too. That was back before people called the day after Thanksgiving "black Friday." We were some of the pioneers who made black Friday black!

I think it was about 1980 when my brother James and I were traveling from our college in central Texas (Brownwood) to our home in West Texas (Pecos) in an ice storm. We had an 8-track tape of the Imperials Christmas album playing in the car as we slowly slid halfway across Texas. It was worth the trip though.

A few years later, I took my grad school friend (from Iowa) from Fort Worth to Pecos, an eight-hour drive. After eight hours of desert, a hypnotized Angelia had figured that in the same length of time it took us to get across Texas, she could have probably gone home to Iowa for Thanksgiving.

Every year is a good one, wherever we may be, whomever we may be with. 

By the way, if anyone needs a good dressing recipe, my mom's is the world's best.

Happy Thanksgiving!