If the gravy is too salty it can be salvaged by adding some water, some more corn starch or flour, and a little sugar. If you’ve got good depth of flavor to begin you’ll be fine. As a general rule Chinese food tends to blend with Western food better than Japanese food does. The story about bringing the electric toilet seat through customs when coming down from Canada isn’t worn out yet. Cooking the turkey unstuffed cuts down on the cooking time but not by as much as you may think and not by the amount that it increases the drinking time. Those cream cheese and salami roll-ups that you bought on a whim can be a life saver. When you’ve busted your ass through 16 or 18 years of school and you’re finally out you sometimes have a sense of entitlement when it comes to employment and salary. Grandparents are there to remind you that no matter how sweet the job you’ve landed you’re still part of the human race plus there’s a reason why you have no student loan debt. Argyle sparkling Pinot Noir is a great turkey wine. Do the candles on the iron candle thing in the fireplace benefit from the flue being open or closed? No conclusive answer to this one. Some of the funniest and most endearing things happen at funerals. And on a related topic, the dying need laughter as much as anyone and are quite capable of keeping their end up in this regard. They posthumously provided some of the best stories this year. And they were there laughing with us. I know that's kind of saccharine but we get that way at the table. Even me. We are obsessed with our cats. A RW member of the family dislikes wind power because he finds the windmills aesthetically unpleasing and a blight on the landscape. So are coal-powered plants and acid rain. But still, he’s serious and they are. This is probably the best argument I’ve heard against them. Sometimes a pumpkin pie is a loser no matter how much work you put into it or how predisposed people are to like it. And while Costco pecan pies are dynamite, why do they need to be the size of a manhole cover? I’m not sure where our varied politics come from. They don’t seem to be a function of experience or age or education and they do change. Or mellow, or I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s just an acknowledgement over the table that we are family and we’re all in this together. One thing we do remember, as least the older ones do, is where we came from. And I’m thankful that they’re not shy about reminding the rest of us.
