Curry Squash

I am eating the most heavenly curry dish made from Thanksgiving leftovers. I took the roasted squash and pumpkin I baked yesterday, removed the skin and mixed with a can of coconut milk, added a tablespoon of red curry paste. Mixed until creamy. Scooped it on top of my quinoa stuffing. Delicious. Took about five minutes to prepare.

Being Partnered

Hanging out with Com/Calm dog and observing her loyalty has helped me understand something about myself. I like being in a relationship. Just like Calm looking after me in the apartment and being tuned into me as we take walks, I like to be the same way with a partner. I previously was seeing this as a weakness that I had to overcome but actually it is a characteristic.

Calm is great one-to-one. She's good in groups too - she was in our game circle during post-Thanksgiving socializing. But she is very loyal to her primary person. After Thanksgiving dinner we went out for a walk and another person was going to hold Calm's leash. Calm kept looking for me to be the one holding her lead. It was amazing loyalty considering we've only been together for a few days. I believe I am the same way. I just have to be careful to whom I commit my loyalty.

Wild Turkey

Com/Calm and I went for an early morning walk and to our shock, and that of some other early-risers along Oakland's Piedmont Avenue, there was a wild turkey running down the street. He actually tried to stop a city bus and get on to escape. The bus finally got around Mr. Turkey who then started squawking as he ran down the center of the street, then on to the sidewalk and then across the street. The few cars on the street stopped to watch the bizarre and ironic site. Mr. Turkey impressed us all by puffing out its feathers.

I've cropped this iPhone photo so that you can see the turkey running along the sidewalk towards Fenton's Ice Creamery. He's about to cross the street. Run turkey, run.

This rivals my Thanksgiving in Houston where a man walked down our street exclaiming, in a deep Texas drawl, "somebody's turkey's burning up, somebody's turkey's burning up." In fact, someone burned down their house while trying to deep fry their turkey. This time the turkey got away.

Looking back on some past Thanksgivings, I've had some real adventures. Last year was in Berkeley with my cousin Diana - we had Tofurkey. The previous year was London, previous year in Scotland, the year before that was Houston. This year I'm hosting my cousin Diana and friends here in Oakland.

Mini Winter Wonderland

I love this giant mini city that is setup in the futuristic lobby of the downtown Hyatt in San Francisco. This morning the Designer and Engineer were getting it all ready for the masses.

Tofurkey Trio

Here are the Tofurkey, Foturkeys we had for Thanksgiving at cousin Diana's house. When you spellcheck Tofurkey on a crackberry it suggests the word "divorce" and I can understand the thinking.

Mellow Thanksgiving

This year is a mellow Thanksgiving and a bit melancholy. Feeling a bit homesick for my US and UK families.

I'll be dining on Foturkey/Tofurkey with my cousin Diana in Berkeley whilst my folks are dining with her parents in Westchester County. So, we're having a virtual bi-coastal gathering.

Turns out that my schedule allows me to be off work until Tuesday. My project over the next few days is to take my annual photo expedition to make images for my holiday greeting card. I'm scoping out the Golden Gate Bridge this year. Last year it was The London Eye from the Millennium Bridge over River Thames. Maybe I should make this an annual expedition to bridges around the world.

Ah yes, thinking about photography has pulled me out of my Foturkey stupor.

As a side note, my crackberry doesn't like to spell check Tofurkey and keeps suggesting that the actual spelling is "divorce". I suppose that could be a meat-eating computer programmer's hidden message.

Thanksgiving Across the Pond

Stephen and I made a spectacular Thanksgiving in London last night. We invited over a friend from my work and his partner. Adam is half American, half English and Tabitha is all English so we had a two and a half British and one and a half Americans. Pretty much the current exchange rate.

Even though there was no rush here for shopping I felt the same got-to-get-to-the-store anxiety that you get in the States when preparing the menu. It must just be part of Thanksgiving. We rarely entertain so I had to pick up some essentials such as napkins, placemats, a Pyrex dish and even some water glasses. Thanks to Woolworths it was no great expense.

Here's our menu:

Rack of Lamb - Stephen prepared
Quinoa stuffing - made with quinoa bread, everyone thought it was cornbread! (photo on right)
Roasted butternut squash and sweet potatoes with dried fruit and maple syrup - yum
Minted peas - a bit of a British twist on the meal
Cranberry sauce - for colour
Smashed potatoes - my first attempt
Gravy - from a mix, I admit
Baked apples - studded with cloves and spiked with a Cinnamon stick, sweetened with honey - yum
Chocolate truffles - thanks to our guests

The best part of the meal was how excited Adam and Tabitha were to celebrate their first Thanksgiving. Plus, they kept saying how fantastic everything tasted. Guests like these are always welcome again.