The Day After Thanksgiving.

I realise that most of my readers from outside the States may be slightly confused as to our weird holiday of Thanksgiving. To put it into context, it's basically a harvest festival where we celebrate the harvest and give thanks for our crops/lives/etc... Its foundation is traced back to the Pilgrims first year in America. They sat down with the Native Americans and shared the fruit of their first harvest with their neighbours. Of course, in the intervening years, the children of the first Pilgrim settlers would go on to enslave and kill their Native American neighbours, but the first 15 or so years the settlers and the natives lived in peace.

Americans like to think about the FIRST Thanksgiving in a "good way" and avoid the historical destruction of the Native peoples. But hey... That's colonisation for you. No one has clean hands.

Anyhoo... We spent our "Thanksgiving" with a portion of the extended family. My aunt and uncle had the celebration at their house in Forest Lake, MN. Which is about 30 miles north of the Twin Cities. The typical familial strife was experienced... The same GREAT food was served of course, with a side order of sniping relatives.

Our REAL fun, came about after we had left the family event, and returned to our housesit. My best friend Matt and his partner Anna and his sis Janice were in town from Portland, Oregon for Thanksgiving with THEIR crazy family. The three of them came over to our housesit, and we proceeded to get good and sauced as a remedy for our days. Matt was my best man in my wedding, and we have known each other since we were little kids. It's not easy having my best friend and "brother" living 1000 miles away from me, however... As is the case for MANY best friends... Our time apart doesn't seem to affect our relationship. We are somehow able to pick up right were we left off, and continue our strong relationship.

I'm hoping, that with the friends I've made in Britain, the same will be true. I truly miss my friends over in England, and I'm certain that My Lady feels the same. (I'm certain of this, 'cause she just told me this morning that she was!)

Och weel... My Lady is visiting her friends and family in Britain in January, and I'm hoping that that will help assuage her pain in separation. I, however, must wait a LONGER time before I'm able to visit. This is a really painful fact of life, innit?

Well... I'm off. I want, however, to say a personal THANK YOU to one of my British Friends... Abi, we've received your anniversary gift, and we adore the piece you sent along! It's going to take an honoured space of wall in our new flat in February! Thanks for the well wishing!

To my fine readers, adieu!

--Tuckmac