Some good news today with that Arbery verdict. I was sure those shitheads were guilty, but in America, I was not even remotely positive about them being found guilty. So I was pleasantly surprised with the verdict, but it’s not going to bring back Arbery, nor is it going to change the corrupt system that wouldn’t hqve even charged these murderers unless one of the racist twats hadn’t released the footage of them on the hunt. And I know every American deserves legal defense and what not, but fuck Laura Hogue and she and her cohorts should at the very least face public chastising for their racist fucking bullshit.
In other news, I made the mistake to go out of the house today for groceries, and I won’t be doing that again until this holiday bullshit settles down. I’m so used to my midweek grocery that I forgot all about Thanksgiving crowds, and man they did not let me down. Every worst display of humanity from talking on phones while driving, cutting people off, flipping the finger as they drove, leaving carts everywhere, standing in the middle of aisles blocking shit. I can handle people individually and in small groups, but get a bunch of you together, and man you suck.
And everything was jam packed. Even Frederico’s, my little Italian grocer was just slammed. I got my staples (gallon of olive oil, a large glass container of anchovies, some hard cheese) and GTFO. Never seen the place so slammed before.
Tomorrow I am heading to Gerald’s, and I am excited about that because it means I will not be eating turkey dinner for the next week, turkey sandwiches and turkey salad the entire week after that, and turkey soup the next three months. That is what I call a win.
In other home news, I had my first plant fatality this fall- a beautiful green and red maranta just up and slowly died. No idea if I over or under watered or the move from one side of the house to the other killed it, or if the leaves just fell off for the winter. Poor thing didn’t have a… prayer.
Reverse Festivus?
scav
My gut reaction to Laura Hogue & associates was indeed to wish their biographies were written by Hannah Arendt. Only fitting.
Ken
Dining at Gerald’s sounds like a good plan, but be careful he doesn’t spoil it by insisting you take home “just a few of the leftovers”, while handing you a fifty-pound bag.
dmsilev
All of the T-1 prep is done. Bird is cleaned, broth for gravy is made, cake and pie are baked, servingware cleaned, etc. Mom and I did make one brief grocery run, but doing it at 8:30 this morning minimized the crowd craziness.
MagdaInBlack
Yesterday at lunch I stopped at the local small grocery near work. Went back to work and told them ” Don’t go out there, they’re nuts.”
I did not go near a grocery store today.
Ruckus
John, I thought that if I got out to the supermarket soon enough it would be OK. You do understand how much we under estimated our fellow humans, don’t you? Or how much we over estimated our own lives? The worst was the person at the register ahead of me couldn’t figure out how to pay for their groceries and they bought more than I unloaded off the semi on the dock and that was food for 300 people for 3-4 weeks.
Steeplejack
Cole, you’re making me glad that I wussed out and didn’t go to the store today. I was going to get just a few odds and ends but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. I’ve got enough provisions to get through until Friday. Not exactly a siege.
Hope you have a good time at Gerald’s.
Mike in NC
We went to Costco last Thursday for the first time in a couple of months. It was absolutely mobbed. Don’t listen to the media idiots who think the economy is in shaky condition.
Leto
Purchased most stuff last week, but yesterday had to stop by the local supermarket to grab a few things (green beans and Brussels sprouts). It reminded me of what I’ve loved for most of the past 18 months: not having to deal with that bullshit. I honestly didn’t mind it before, didn’t have any problems with it, but something’s changed and it’s just annoying now. Too many people, too much noise, just too much.
Martin
“gallon of olive oil, a large glass container of anchovies, some hard cheese”
My dude knows how to party. No need for a play by play, let our imagination do the work.
p.a.
I love T-givings where I get invites from people who don’t like leftovers!
MisterForkbeard
@Ruckus: I was in the local Trader Joe’s this morning and there were only 1 or 2 people in each lane, and only half the checkout lanes were open.
Chacal Charles Caltrop
@Martin: sounds like Caesar salad dressing for masses of people to me.
I did go to the green market today because I am bringing the salad tomorrow. Feeding frenzy was the phrase that came to mind.
MagdaInBlack
@Leto: Right there with ya. Too much.
raven
We had planned for a group of about 12 for an outdoor meal (it’s supposed to be mid-60’s) but half bailed so it’ll be just six but that is just fine.
Redshift
We’re having Thanksgiving dinner at my parents’ on Saturday, so I’m weirdly relaxed and don’t have to do any shopping. I’m planning to sleep in tomorrow and then do some work on getting the house ready for my niece, who’s going to be staying with us some of the time during the next week.
Since I missed the earlier thread, I’m thankful for this place. The things we’ve been through the past couple of years have been less bad because we’ve been through them together.
NotMax
Reminded me there’s a can or two of anchovy stuffed olives someplace in the recesses of the pantry.
Danielx
Thanksgiving at inlaws today, originally scheduled for everyone to arrive at noon and eat at two. We were there at 12:30 and were the first arrivees, rest of them straggled in with last arriving at 3:30 or thereabouts. Finally got out of there at 6:30. Lovely people, but six hours of them…too much.
lowtechcyclist
Today was a day to avoid grocery stores at all costs. But I’d finally gotten an appointment to get new tires installed at the Clinton, MD Wal-Mart, which is about 40 minutes from my house, and the nearest WallyWorld with an automotive department. And I bought some groceries there while I was waiting for my tires to be put on, and it really wasn’t bad at all.
Friday, of course, it’ll totally flip: Wal-Mart, Target, etc. will be mobbed, and the grocery stores will be quiet.
Ken
@Danielx: Was dinner inedible, or does the family late-for-everything gene cover cooking too?
NotMax
Will probably repeat this in morning thread, but as it’ll be a holiday dunno how many will be here.
Now through 11:59 p.m. PST on the 29th, Hulu is offering a year of streaming (the tier which includes ads) for 99 cents per month.
pat
Our local grocery store (Festival) was selling spruce wreaths for $10 !!!
Who can resist? It is hanging over the fireplace mantel and giving a wonderful scent to the whole house.
Friend coming for dinner tomorrow, Cornish hens, roasted yams with apples and onions, cranberry sauce and cranberry orange relish, pumpkin pie…. Cocktail shrimp and prosecco to begin. Spellcheck suggests to change prosecco to prosecutor, but hey we have had that and by god it worked!!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’m not hosting but I had to go to the liquor store and grocery store for a couple of things to bring> I was dreading both but I must’ve timed it right. Parking lots were crowded, and the grocery store aisles were like rush hour, but I walked right up to a check out lane behind somebody finishing up. Lots of turkeys in that section, fresh produce in abundance, but the only frozen spinach left was organic.
opiejeanne
John Cole, did you just make a prayer plant joke?
I’m so proud of you.
James E Powell
It’s going to be our second consecutive low-impact Thanksgiving. No big gathering, so no food for 20 dishes.
Nicole
My better half is baking a chocolate bourbon pecan pie right now. It’s going to be a struggle not to touch it before dinner tomorrow.
I’m glad the jury came to the right decision, but I’m still so sad. As a friend of mine put it, Arbery did not get justice today; the People got justice. There is no justice for him and never can be.
Dan B
Speaking of Marantas we were given a close relation with irregularly splotches leaves in gree, pink, white and dark rose. It was a division of their plant that was about eighteen inches tall. Ours is pushing four feet and as wide in our little living room. Theirs in their huge living room is kaput. Sad. Ours is not multiple crowns yet
Marantas come and go.
debbie
@Nicole:
Is that pie Maida Heater’s recipe? OMG! ?
Chetan Murthy
@Nicole: Nobody wants to be the one who has to bury their own child. His poor mother, his poor father, his entire family.
You’re right: there is no real justice for them.
Dan B
We were to be seven at my brother’s but my nephew and his husband got a rescue that had been traumatized. Last week it peed in the car, apparently it was rescued during a drive from California to Canada. I wanted to see this pup who is a designer cross of German Shepherd abd Corgi. Thick body, upright ears and short legs – pure black.
J R in WV
@NotMax:
Hulu should be FREE in Hawai’i — come on, that’s where it’s from !!!
Chetan Murthy
@Dan B:
OoOoh! That might be a handsome, handsome pooch.
Dan B
@Chetan Murthy: Quite a list of family who have been left in grief with a strong sense of the horror that was visited on him and now resides in their hearts and minds. Apparently his mother appealed to a group called Grassroots Justice who did a full court press to bring this case to trial.
Dan B
@Chetan Murthy: I have heard that the body and legs are out of sync. Maybe there will be pictures.
And the “designer” is they can’t be created the old fashioned method.
Belafon
Hogue has been indicted for obstruction of justice.
Chetan Murthy
@Dan B: OK, uh, that all sounds disturbing. I hope the pooch is at least not crippled in any way.
satby
I’m not going anywhere and I scored a corned beef brisket at 1/2 off, so I’m making that for dinner tomorrow and instead of turkey sandwich leftovers I get to have Reubens. WIN!
BigJimSlade
I’m making chicken and leeks tomorrow – no huge turkey to deal with! And english muffin toasting bread, sweet potatoes (sliced into medallions and roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper), and basic green beans. Easy peasy. And we’re having this for dinner. No ridiculous 3pm mealtime!
NotMax
@J R in WV
Ladeez and germs, Trixie Friganza!
;)
satby
@NotMax: You find the oddest stuff ?
Benw
Got the important things at Whole Foods today: pies and taco ingredients for tomorrow! It wasn’t too bad – a little extra crowded but they had extra cashiers so it was fine.
CaseyL
I’m going to a small gathering tomorrow, and was tasked with bringing pies.
I went to Whole Foods yesterday (say what you will about them, their pies are excellent) in early afternoon. It wasn’t bad, but was starting to fill up by the time I was checking out. I didn’t go near a supermarket today, and am grateful I didn’t have to.
However, I will have to deal with holiday traffic tomorrow, which I’m not looking forward to. Bleh.
ETA: Benw and I are both big fans of Whole Foods pies!
Ruckus
@Chetan Murthy:
There never is real justice.
In this country we jail people for the rest of their lives, we used to kill them, some places still do. And sometimes the TPTB decide that this life wasn’t worth their bother. But/And it is never real justice. Someone’s life was taken, not in accident, but with malice. There is nothing that will bring back that person, there is no justice for their death.
There is retribution but that is as good as it gets.
We talk about justice, like we can reset history, but we can’t.
This case will never have justice associated with it because this man was willfully murdered. The moment those 3 men decided that another man had to die, there was no justice possible.
We have to stop thinking that justice is possible because it isn’t. Nothing will bring back this man, his life, his place on earth. There is nothing that will do that. That does not mean those responsible should not suffer, they should, they murdered a human being for being born with skin darker than theirs. But nothing done to them will be justice.
NotMax
@satby
Just for fun, how about another?
mrmoshpotato
Mmmmmmmmm yummo!
laura
The deviled egg slurry is in a zippy bag and ready for piping. The sagey sausage roll slurry is ready to roll into the puff pastry slathered with dijon and a brush of egg wash and then baked in a Hot Oven in the am and consumed in a nearby park. We’ve scaled back human interaction and hope that we can commune with some folks and scurry back to the abode with some warm feels and social knots tightened just a bit.
Benw
@CaseyL: high five fellow WF pie fan!
:)
Good luck with the traffic!
zhena gogolia
@Belafon: What are you referring to?
ETA: You mean Jackie Johnson?
John Cole
@opiejeanne: I indeed did.
John Cole
@satby: I need to send you some kraut for those reubens or did I offer kraut to you and you sneered at it? I forget.
NotMax
@laura
If you drape a sprig of parsley atop each deviled egg, would that be…
…the slurry with the fringe on top?
:)
Jude
Marantas are extremely sensitive to humidity shifts and typically keel over when we start to run dry central heat. Not your fault, John. Blame it one the weather.
Lacuna Synecdoche
John Cole @ Top:
Went shopping this afternoon, and Trader Joe’s was a little busy, but nothing like what you describe above. Reading about shit like that makes me so glad I live among the sane real Americans in Midtown Manhattan.
eclare
I went to the eye dr today and got my contact lens prescription renewed, first trip there since March of last year. Then I stopped at Walgreens to pick up a few things, busy, but not overwhelming. I noticed piles of Binax tests for sale near the checkout, which I guess is a good thing?
Dan B
@NotMax: When you got it, you got it. Trixie’s got it!
And I hope there’s a cure!!
Chetan Murthy
@Lacuna Synecdoche:
I read about your bars and coffeeshops with mandatory vaxx proof checking at the entrances, and I’m jealous, jealous, jealous. And I live in *San Francisco*! You guys in NYC are doing great, keep it up. Showing the rest of the country how it’s supposed to be *done*! I just wish my own city would, y’know, be a better understudy.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
No idea what the grocery stores are like, we started getting grocery delivery in lockdown and never stopped. I think that’s one of the things that’s never going to go back to the way it was.
There’s a couple of smaller stores we visit in person for odds and ends between deliveries. But for the most part we get our groceries from those deliveries every 2-3 weeks.
opiejeanne
Dry-brined a turkey for Friday because we won’t be able to bring leftovers back, and we love turkey sandwiches. Riding the train to the family dinner with two pies: apple and pumpkin. The apple pie only took three apples. Ida-reds, really big apples. One of them weighed just about a pound. That pie smells heavenly and so does the pumpkin pie but the apple pie fragrance drowns it out.
My son is here for tomorrow’s party and will come up to our house on Friday for More Turkey! He just announced that he’s engaged.
To a woman.
We all thought he was gay, he’s been in relationships with guys most of his adult life, but he’s always insisted that he wasn’t gay. He had a painful crush on a girl down the street when he was in High School, so ???
I dunno. I just hope they’re happy and he’s not doing this for some wrong reason, like misplaced guilt or wanting to be “normal”, but he’s 51 so he should know what he wants by now. She has 2 kids, a boy and a girl, 13 and 14, and they all like each other. He refers to them as his future kids.
One big visible fly in the ointment is that she’s a Jehovah’s Witness.
eclare
@opiejeanne: Congrats on the new daughter in law! I’m not really sure what Jehovah’s Witnesses believe, except, IIRC, they were exempt from saying the pledge of allegiance when I was in elementary school.
CaseyL
@opiejeanne: She’s a Jehovah’s Witness, and he’s bisexual? Best of luck to them both, but talk about big differences! (I might be wrong about the Witnesses; they might not have the usual fundamentalist attitude towards non-heterosexuality.)
Steeplejack
@eclare:
Yeah, good that they’re apparently readily available again. When I was at CVS for my booster shot a couple of weeks ago they had them stashed behind the counter and you had to ask for them.
Kent
Did all our shopping last week at the local Costco with no hassle. We have one 5 min away that adjacent (separated by a fence) from the school where I teach.
Middle daughter is on the way home from Seattle as we write. Taking the Amtrak Cascades from Seattle. Very nice to have legit mass transit options along this corridor. Some of you may remember our college search saga last year. She ended up picking UW and this will be her first trip home from college. She seems to be doing well in school and is busy with the Husky Marching Band so we’ve seen her half a dozen times that we drove up for games. Was very dismayed by her Chemistry mid-term which was an 85 until I told her to check the actual curve and the median score was about a 52. College grades are different she has discovered.
Amazing how easy it is to travel car-free between Camas WA (Portland suburbs) and Seattle. She took the new subway from UW to downtown Seattle in 10 min, walked a block over to the Amatrak station, and boarded the Amtrak Cascades which is the relatively frequent and fast train between Eugene in the south and Vancouver BC in the north. It is 3 hours by train to get home which is the same as by car with no traffic. I imagine that I-5 was a mess today so probably actually faster to take the train. Cheap too, only about $30.
Nothing exciting on the menu. As the main cook in the household I have discovered no one wants you to get very creative during Thanksgiving. So I basically devote myself to making the traditional basics as well as I can. I always spatchcock the turkey according to the NYT instructions which works better for me than any other method. My mother comes and handles the whipped potatoes as only she can do. We will have 12 tomorrow. Combination of family and friends. No MAGA dipshit relatives, should be a relaxing day.
My main mission tomorrow is to watch football with Daughter #2 and teach her the basics of football as she has been watching games from the perspective of the marching band for 5 seasons now between HS and college and still has absolutely no idea what is happening. But she has finally asked Dad for a tutorial so I’ll be doing lots of pausing of the Cowboy’s game and talking about motion, coverages, position responsibilities, and rules so she can watch the game more intelligently. That’s what happens when you have only girls.
Mary G
Going to my long term substitute aunt/mom’s. She’ll never let me bring anything but I consider my de-brainwashing of the staunch but totebagging rich Dems who watch The News Hour fair value. Weather has been extremely more spectacular than normal, but it’s extremely stressful seeing 0 to 3% chance of rain for the 10-day forecast week after week.
I put my neighbor on notice that his sprinklers are rotting out my garage as well as disfiguring my redwood fence with white mineral deposits. My sensible suggestions of using 3-sided sprinklers or switching to drip as well as applying mulch over the hardpan clay soil were rejected with prejudice and it appears we may be going to war. Fun!
Jackie
@Kent: I am the oldest of three daughters and played trumpet in the pep band in jr high and sr high. I started watching basketball games with Dad to learn the game (gotta know when it’s appropriate to blast CHARGE!)
Then started reading “boys books” (mid-1960’s) to learn more about basketball, baseball and football. Baseball, I loved early, and still do to this day.
Until the day Dad died, we watched sports together. One of many cherished memories I have of Daddy.
Yutsano
@Kent: Wait…is she skipping Apple Cup tomorrow? You could also go over that with her. I’m so glad that she sounds like she’s thriving with the band. I hope she does end up sticking with it. If nothing else, hopefully she gets her first bowl game next year. Nothing cements love of college band geekdom like that!
gbear
I ordered for pick up at Target today and although the parking lot was really full, the customer service desk line was super short when I walked in and the store didn’t seem that crowded. The person who pulled the order accidentally put the milk and cheese into the freezer case instead of the refrigerator, so the woman behind the desk had them pull unfrozen ones, and gave me a $5 gift card for having to hang around. People in that store used to be very good about masking (like 95%), but it appears to be slipping a bit. I wear my mask and try to get out of the store as quickly as possible.
Kent
God no! Apple Cup is Friday, not tomorrow. And we have season tickets. We will drive back up to Seattle with her on Friday to watch the Apple Cup and see the band perform then return back home Friday night. Then put her back on the Amtrak back to Seattle on Sunday. So lots of back and forth.
eclare
@Kent: That tutorial sounds like fun!
Will
Does anyone know if the tweet making its rounds all around the internet tonight about the Washington DC public school system sending suggestions to parents on how to decolonize their Thanksgiving and replace giving thanks with a land acknowledgement is legit? Is this another right wing made up crazy thing that isn’t really happening like CRT?
Chetan Murthy
@Will: dcpolicycenter.org/publications/landscape-of-diversity-in-dc-public-schools/
Yutsano
@Kent: Huh…I’m trying to figure out where I saw it was on Thanksgiving. I was hoping not, as that’s never happened before. I know we would bus over from Pullman and have to be back by the game. I’m not sure where my brain was.
I’m half-tempted to tell your daughter to say hi to Brad* for me. Maybe I’ll just pop round to his office when I’m in town in February. Heck maybe I’ll fake being in the pep band again and go to a basketball game just for nostalgia!
*Brad being J. Bradly McDavid. The director of the Husky bands and a dear old friend I wouldn’t mind seeing again.
Will
@Chetan Murthy: What do your cited stats have to do with whether or not the latest right wing crazy train is real or not?
Chetan Murthy
@Will: it might be useful to google “decolonize thanksgiving land acknowledgement”
Will
@Chetan Murthy: Again, what do your cited stats have to do with asking if the email that the right wing is passing around is real or not?
Chetan Murthy
@Will: It’s not a crazy thing to want to “decolonize thanksgiving” and offer a “land acknowledgement”. If you read down the links from that search, you’ll find that it’s actually something with a diverse set of proponents.
Will
@Chetan Murthy: Yeah, I googled what you said and I don’t even know what to say. No one I know runs around during Thanksgiving dressed up and acting like pilgrims or Native Americans or telling hilariously untruthful stories about pilgrims and Native Americans joyously spending time together. Most people I know celebrate Thanksgiving like they celebrate Christmas, it is just an excuse to get together with family, argue, and get fat off food.
If this is really a message that is being pushed by the left, I feel sorry for us. Can’t people just enjoy a holiday? This is like the stupid arguments from Christians about “Happy Holidays” and people taking the CHRIST out of CHRISTmas (lol). I’m not a Christian but I celebrate Christmas cause I love the tree and lights plus giving and getting wrapped gifts. I like having a holiday with family and eating and watching football.
Why does every holiday have to be a stupid fight over someone being wronged or believing in Jeebus?
Msb
Happy Thanksgiving to you, John, and everyone at BJ!
Chetan Murthy
@Will: Everyone who grew up in America absorbed a story of what Thanksgiving is about, that is simply false. I’m 56 and went thru most of school in Texas: the truth about our genocide of Native Americans figured *nowhere* in our classes (nor for that matter did the truth about Reconstruction and Jim Crow — right down to no mention of the Tulsa Massacre that happened 300mi away).
To say “why can’t we just celebrate T-day” is to say “why can’t we leave undisturbed the stories we’ve told ourselves about our conquest and genocide”.
Here’s another example: do you know the name Junipero Serra? He’s a bit of a hero to some — he’s got his name on an important road in SF, statues here-and-there, etc. But there are quite a few Native American organizations that view him as a profoundly evil man, and want him scrubbed from those laudatory positions in public life. And with good reason, once one goes and actually investigates what life was like in the Spanish missions of early Spanish colonialism (which, again, we were never taught about, even though of course our Texas History courses covered Spanish colonization).
Chetan Murthy
@Will:
Also, for adults, this might be the case. For children: they’re learning the history of our holidays, both in school and at home. So for them, it isn’t *just* a holiday.
More examples: when did you learn that even if there were a Jesus Christ, he certainly wasn’t born on Christmas, and that in fact the early Church leaders chose the day, in order to draw worshipers from the Roman feast of Saturnalia ? Did you ever learn it? Do you think it’s worth teaching children this? And if not, why not?
I remember reading a particularly moving essay on what, to a Jewish person, is Christmas? And specifically, to an Eastern European Jewish person. And it turns out, to that Jewish person, it was memories told down thru the generations of pogrom-after-pogrom, as drunk Polish Christians would invade and destroy Jewish villages and homes. On Christmas, naturally.
NotMax
@Chetan Murthy
Tinselnacht.
//
Jackie
Well, this thread is going off the tracks.
Happy Thanksgiving to Cole and the jackals. Hope everyone’s belly gets stuffed with whatever goodness your belly’s desire!
Will
@Chetan Murthy:
I don’t think everyone absorbed it as much as you think. I think most people, once they got to a certain age, knew damn well that we killed off most of the Native Americans rather than sharing food with them. I’m sorry you had such a distraught education, but even in the heart of Tennessee Appalachia that is full blown die hard Republican, we learned about the Trail of Tears and how local tribes like the Cherokee were moved west and that thousands died on the march. We learned about using blankets from smallpox patients in an attempt to kill the Native Americans.
So on top of us already getting headaches from arguing with family, you think we should spend the day self flagellating over the taking of land from Native Americans? You must be a joy at parties.
If anyone thinks that is a winning message for Democrats, woah boy are we screwed.
Chetan Murthy
Fascinating: juancole.com/2021/11/lincolns-invention-thanksgiving.html
Lincoln’s Invention of Thanksgiving was all About how Black Lives Matter
Chetan Murthy
@Will: Which is why I noted that DC public schools are overwhelmingly Black and Hispanic.
eclare
@Jackie: Cheers! Seconded. I get my aunt’s pecan pie tomorrow!
Will
@Chetan Murthy:
Are you insinuating that Black and Hispanic people don’t want to just enjoy Thanksgiving with their families and get fat off food too? If that is the case, that’s a pretty racist take.
Chetan Murthy
@Will:
Long ago when I was in grad school I had a friend who was (surely still is) a lesbian. I went to her home for T-day that year, and accompanied her family to their Catholic church. A while later, I asked her how she could still be a Catholic, after the way they treated LGBTQ people. And she had a piercing answer: “Your mother might mistreat you, beat you, etc; do you stop loving your mother? Well, the church is like a mother: you can love her while still acknowledging her faults.”
There is a school of thought that we can only love America by ignoring her faults and crimes. But others believe that to truly love America, we have to be fully aware of her faults, sins, crimes. And we have to do what we can to redress them in the present-day. You might be right, that this isn’t a great message to carry to the Great Unwashed. You might be right. But this is (to me) how adults approach love of country.
Will
@Jackie: Apologies, Jackie, you are correct. It’s late and I’m up helping the wife when she wants an extra hand. Was scrolling twitter and saw the right hyperventilating. I took this to be an open thread and thought someone might know if this is just fake CRT crap. I thought I would get a simple answer from someone that digs into this stuff more than me. I didn’t expect to get locked into an argument with the they are going to put us in camps and murder us crowd. I’ll shut up now.
Chetan Murthy
@Will: No, rather, that the DC schools might think that their student bodies were more open to doing these things than, say, the well-fed suburban families of suburban Virginia who voted-in Trumpkin.
Chetan Murthy
@Will: No, rather, that the DC schools might think that their student bodies were more open to doing these things than, say, the well-fed suburban families of suburban Virginia who voted-in Trumpkin.
opiejeanne
@CaseyL: I need to ask him quietly if he’s been honest with her about his prior relationships, but I’m a little afraid to do so.
eclare
@opiejeanne: That is scary, but it sounds like a needed conversation
Bruce K in ATH-GR
My family is having its first full Thanksgiving gathering in over a decade tonight; weirdly, it took my parents moving to Greece to retire to enable us all to be together in one place. Mom wanted to do the traditional thing, slightly hampered by the issue that turkeys are traditionally a Christmas bird around here, and there’s no holiday here that truly corresponds to Thanksgiving. That, plus some of the other staples of an American Thanksgiving are hard to come by here (cranberries are rare, and forget about finding a ready-made crust for a pumpkin pie). But we’ll manage, and get into the spirit of the day. Thankfully we’re in a country where fascist murderers are given prison sentences, not Congressional internships.
satby
@John Cole: I would never ever sneer at kraut! You didn’t mention it. Probably the discussion about what Monkey Farts* smells like distracted you.
Gvg
@Chetan Murthy: I think you got a message about thanksgiving that I never did. I always understood that the pilgrim and Indian thanksgiving feast was one time that preceded all the times the various groups of settlers and multiple tribes of Indians fought each other with natives ultimately losing out, so that it was ironic and cruel that the first mercy of teaching and charity did not get rewarded. I still think it is normal to be grateful you didn’t starve to death the prior year which is what I got from the thanksgiving story.
However from a historical point of view, it would not have significantly changed anything if those Indians had wiped the white men out or let them starve. There were population and land reasons that the more populated Europe was going to spread out and move in on the less populated and armed Americas. Also you are kind of ignoring that the natives were mostly not friendly either and fought brutally too. They were hampered by not being unified, not having guns or mass production and bad luck on infectious diseases.
WaterGirl
@Benw: Now i want tacos.
J R in WV
@Mary G:
Sounds like next step should include estimates for a new garage and fence, along with a bitter letter written by a lawyer. A slight case could have been made that it was an innocent accident in the past, that’s behind him now! Show no mercy, the neighbor is now a hostile idiot deliberately damaging your property.
tam1MI
@CaseyL:She’s a Jehovah’s Witness, and he’s bisexual
THEY FIGHT CRIME! ;)