A week of Thanksgiving

Travel Day:
It all started out last Tuesday night. Tuesday was my Friday. I took Wednesday off of work so I could drive up to Utah for the big November holiday. It started off really early in the day, namely at 6am! I think its been about 12 years since I've been up that early. Yup, 12 years. I'm that lazy. Ahhhhh (sigh of accomplishment.) So then we go to pick our friend Jeff up. He's tagging along to save a few bucks. I easily convince Jeff to come to get Donuts with us. Cheryl went for her usual order of a chocolate bar and an old fashion glazed, but I went for a maple bar and a Bear-claw. Ohhh Yaaah. They were great! I like it when the maple frosting isn't to sweet, and not to thick, but adds just the right amount of maple taste to the beautifully fried donut bread. I've found two places around where i live that can accommodate my tastes. Then the bear claw was massive. tasty fried donut bread, wrapped around a glob of apple pie filling, and doused in cinnamon. Its like a regular glazed donut AND a apple filled donut all in ONE! The bear-claws are cut 3-4 times on one edge to help the donut fry more evenly and to give it its unique 'bear claw' shape. I don't get them to often, but this was a special occasion. I usually don't eat when I drive long distance due to tiredness, but this was a special occasion, and I figured this time eating would help me stay awake.

Then the mega-drive began. I had plotted out our route of travel the night before, so our course was set. It was smooth sailing all the way to Las Vegas. But then just 10 minutes past vegas EVERY-body slows down. A-LOT. Then we were creeping along in stop-n-go traffic for about 20 minutes, then i finally turned off the car for the next 1 hour! Talk about the worst part of driving anywhere! I called some people on my cellular telephone and my brothers wife took all the information that we gave her and formulated a few different web searches and then told us that there was a horrible accident only a few miles ahead of us. Luckily Cheryl and I are on America's most reliable network, so we had coverage the entire trip ... , when needed that is. So after Tiffany told us that it was at a certain mile marker, two minutes later traffic slowly started to move, and it gained speed and held at 35-40 for a while. When we got to the specified mile marker and we saw cop cars and tow trucks, and other cars pulled off to the other side of the road. As we approached our anticipation grew. We had, after all, been waiting to find out what the crap was slowing me down for the last 90 minutes! We could see see car debris and liquid spilled all over the road at a specific spot, which we called 'Point of Impact'. A little further up the road we could see a car on a tow truck. Seconds later the tow truck sprang to life- it was on our side of the road, but was facing toward us, so I knew there was some sort of weird problem. As it moved, it drove across the dirty ditch median and onto the correct side of the road, going the correct way. At that point the tow truck was 200 yards away, as it got close, I readied my camera and snapped a picture as it was across the way from us. the car that was on the back of the flat-bed tow truck made me sick. Just picture a car that had been smashed in a junk yard. It was completely flattened. I was curious because I didn't see any ambulances. which made me sicker in my stomach. I think whatever took us 90 minutes to endure just made someone's holiday miserable, if not... non-existent. If you know what I mean. So anyway, traffic picked us and I drove us safely all the way to Cedar City, where the car conveniently rolled to a stop at the local Wendy's! Ohhh la la. Cheryl drove the rest of the way, which allowed me time to rest, and more time to chat it up with Jeff. (My voice was already horse from talking for the last 5 hours with him.) When I was awake though her driving did make me nervous. She just handles the car VERY differently than I do. She's quick and jerky with the wheel, as where I am smooth and gentle. As she jumps on the accelerator like shes in the Indy-500 and stops like she's a stunt car driver, as where I am smooth like silk on the accelerator, and soft like a fluffy pillow when I break.

We finally get there late in the after noon/ early evening. The last time I got out of the car it was 40 degrees warmer. There was actually snow on the ground, and ice. My brother and his wife were waiting for us to go to see the latest twilight movie with them. We had to hurry out the door again and rush off to the theater. The movie was OK, and even funny, but only because of my hilarious comments throughout the whole thing. I realized that most people there were on their 3-4th time of seeing it so I felt free to interrupt as I felt necessary. I was great! the comedy that spouted from my lips was some of the greatest ever! We laughed about my funniness the whole way home, and for the next three days.

Thanksgiving Day:
We were rudely woken up my my obnoxious brother early in the morning. Apparently they wanted help with making food for the day's feast. I argued that I knew nothing of this need of theirs for me to help, otherwise I would have definitely shown up later in the day. But Cheryl stepped in and agreed that we could help. Then I was mad at Cheryl for volunteering me to help make food. Sure its no big deal to make food for a party or what have you, but at my house you have to follow every recipe exactly right (my mom likes weird recipes sometimes), other wise everyone will be babies and complain and try to get me in trouble. Then you have to fight for food-prep space the entire time, then you have to fight to keep that space cause everyone wants to be where I am. And when you start asking for ingredients NOBODY knows where they are. I get down to the kitchen and start looking for my ridiculous assignment that Cheryl had just volunteered us to help with, when I spot a zip-lock bag full of sweet-rolls! Ahh, Breakfast is served! I had one or two, I can't remember, and they were Good. As I enjoyed it all the way down to my belly, I knew it would be the start of a beautiful day.

But anyway, I was working to get ready to prepare this food item for the group feast when I thought to myself "hmmm, Why am I here alone? Didn't I get volunteered for this food duty by someone else? I wonder where that other person is cause I'm not doing this by myself!" So I go upstairs to see there this person was who volunteered me, and it turns out they had just ran into the bathroom to 'get ready for the day'. which in guy language it means 'I'm busy for the next 45 minutes'.[ I don't know how girls can just sit and look at themselves in the mirror for that long. I know what I look like and I know I'm not gonna change so I don't need to look. I glance at myself in the mirror on occasion to make sure I'm still normal looking, but that's it. None of this vain 45 minute gazing.] So I even more annoyedly march back downstairs and complete my task. Then I wandered off to avoid more weird random assignments not completed by other people.

When the lunch bell rang everyone came out from all of our hiding places and we came to the next big task of the day, finding a place for everybody to sit. This is a very strategic decision. My Dad always sits furthest from the kitchen, and my mom always sits closest to the kitchen, so my Dad can ask for things and my mom can go fetch them, now everybody along the sides is seen as people to go and fetch more stuff while mom is busy. Sure we could tell him NO, but then it would make him grumpy, and then making it an awkward day for everybody. So, us brothers have learned that he's less likely to impose upon people he's not directly related to, so they will sit closer to the kitchen. Then my little brother showed up with a completely different menu than the rest of us, thus changing the table dynamic completely, so he moved to the #2 position, right behind my mom.
Ya, so my little brother decided, I don't know when, that he wanted fried rice and hot wings for Thanksgiving, rather than the usual goods. Yup, he had a huge plate of hotwings, and luckily his wife could talk him out of the rice. I mean really! who eats rice on Thanksgiving! I think the 2 year Chinese speaking mission really changed him.

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