The Day of the Feast Approaches

Tuesday night (Wednesday morning, really) we awoke to the sound of a bomber landing in our living room. Or so we thought. Once we were fully awake, up with all the lights on and had stopped running into each other and the walls we learned it was just the dishwasher in what we now know to have been death throes. Yesterday we paid a guy from Sears $70 to call it. So we've got under 2 weeks until we host Thanksgiving dinner and no dishwasher. My mother accurately predicted an event like this when she first visited us in this house and discovered the appliances were all GE. "I hate GE appliances" she said. I knew she would. She says it more often than she says "I love you." I've come to think of it as her own special term of endearment, in fact.

(As I write this, Sarah, who is supposed to be napping but is most definitely not, is putting an overnight diaper on her gigantic stuffed bear. No, wait, it's mid-day, she's returned the overnight diaper to the drawer and replaced it with a pull-up.)

So anyway, dirty dishes are piling to the ceiling in my kitchen right now because I'm sampling every recipe I can think of that might be good for Thanksgiving. Today we'll be smoking some pecans and walnuts. I'm making cheese & beer bread at this very moment and considering a go at the pumpkin bread recipe I just found. Lentil soup (I added bacon) is simmering on the stovetop, even though I'm not considering it for Thanksgiving. It just sounded good on this cold day. So - Virginia Druekes, if there is something you're craving or even something you hate, now's the time to speak up. This week has been dedicated to sampling recipes and once it's over the menu will be set in stone!