Alright, this is a bit early, I admit, but I wanted to just write it out while it's on my mind and I'm feeling excellent (thanks to a very nice playlist on Grooveshark, and my bad weekend habit of not getting up until oh... about NOON (so lazy...)). Also because, when Thanksgiving rolls around... I will be gone. I actually recently discovered that I won't even be here Monday night!

I know, you're all terribly sad. Just broke your hearts right there.

But anyway, it is my desire to tell you all a story from my youth about this wonderful holiday that ruins diets all across the country. And since all of my favorite buddies are offline, I have time to type up this very entertaining tale that has passed into the mythology of my family.

This Thanksgiving, I was somewhere around the ages of 10-12, and all the family we gave a damn about were there; Aunts and Uncle, Great Grandma, Grandma, Grandpa, my parents and I. But of course the grandparents were there, for you see, we were at their house that year instead of my aunt's. Now, there were a couple reasons for this switch; the most annoying to myself was the massive TV, which, in true family-holiday spirit, was tuned loyally to football. I was off in a corner playing my Gameboy, I suspect, and likely a Pokemon game. Anyway, the second reason was outside on the back porch.

It was my grandfather's new grill. Let me say now, this was (and still is) a DAMN NICE GRILL. And it better have been, I think you could've bought a decent used car for a similar price. Not only was it a stainless steel finish, with convenient nitches for every grilling tool known to mankind, but it also came with a rotisserie... thing. So guess how the turkey was being cooked? That's right, out on the closed grill on low for half the day. I was somewhat pleased by this, it meant I wouldn't have to smell the goodness all day.

But anyway, while the turkey serenely spun in its toasty environment, Mother and Aunt and I set out to craft the rest of the dinner. The ham, the mashed potatoes, the corn, the carrots, the stuffings, the gravy, the obligatory platters of vegetables, cheeses, sliced summer sausage, devilled eggs and the like, to ruin your appetite for dinner, of course, so you'd have to eat cold sliced turkey sandwiches with a bit of mayo for the next week and a half (best week and a half of the year of lunches I'd ever bring to school, in my opinion). The family otherwise watched football and drank wine and talked amongst themselves. I probably messed with a cat or dog or two. But the time for dinner was approaching and so was the time the ridiculous sports game would be over, so I, I was excited. I lept glancing, every commercial break, at the clock, at the grill outside, then back to my video game, for likely an hour. I forgot for awhile to perform this routine, became rather preoccupied with my game, I'd bet, so when the clock struck the next hour, I was rather surprised. I glanced out at the grill and paused, curiously. I looked towards my grandfather, who looked rather content sipping his glass of BlackCat, but I had to ask.

"Grandpa, should the grill really be smoking like that?"

He glanced out at it, unconcerned. My mother and Uncle Travis objected as well when they glimpsed the curls of smoke rising from the grill.

"Ah, shuddup ya pussies," came by grandfathers response as the game returned from commercial break.

Well, my uncle decided he was going to check the turkey after a few nervous minutes of watching bits of smoke, to settle the doubts of the pussies. I was bored, so I followed him out the back door.

He approached the grill, both of us interestedly watching the wispy bits of light grey smoke issuing from the corners. Then he stepped forward, and, as a couple other family members opened the backdoor to see how things were going, he threw back the lid. Instantly, a massive, mushrooming fireball roared out of the grill, singing away my uncle trav's eyebrows as he leapt backwards in shock, and I, being the little pyro I was and still kind of am, gaped appreciatively.

Gasps and laughs of astonishment rose with the fireball as Trav swore and turned the grill off with a hesitant yet urgent leap forward towards the controls and the fireball slowly faded away to nothing.

The turkey, it was discovered, had come untied in the grill and caught on the lower section, which had eventually ignited it spectacularly. Expectedly, once we managed to bemusedly transport the poor thing inside, my grandfather hardly said a word. Yet he did put quite the effort into peeling back the two inches of charcoal from the meat to try some and prove to the pussies that it was still perfectly fine and delicious. Honestly, it wasn't, but if you like dry, oddly smokey turkey, I guess it would've been your thing.

I suppose if a moral of the story must be given, it would go something like this: "Never call someone a pussy over concerns in the cooking of a turkey, as it is bound to end in epic fail that no one will ever, EVER, let you forget about."

Happy Thanksgiving everyone, and don't light anything aflame aside from candles for me, mmkay?