Blogs | Daily Crasher
Thanksgiving Dinner
By Josh Board | Posted November 27, 2009, 5:44 p.m.
One of my old friends from high school asked me via Facebook, about my Thanksgiving traditions and customs. I told her with a Jewish family, it was always buying Butterballs half-off.
But the last two years, I've had the Thanksgiving feast with Amy and Eber, a couple of interesting local writers I met at a friends party five years ago.
Last year Eber was doing a lot of texting. I was next to him on the couch, having our usual movie debates. He looked up and apologized for the flurry of texts, saying "My son just quit his job and go be on 'American Idol'."
He went on to explain that his son Adam [Lambert] was the understudy in Wicked -- a play my girlfriend loved. A play I didn't see because...well, it's was a play.
He told us something about Adam making the top 10, but that he couldn't share any more of the details with us. We told him we'd watch the show. We never did.
It was cool to see all the stories as Adam was rising to the top.
Since his son appeared on Letterman the night before, I looked for my Letterman shirt to wear. I couldn't find it.
I walked in and found most of the crowd was in a room making turkeys out of construction paper, glue, and various buttons, stickers and things to adorn the bird with.
People would start out drawing their hand and go from there. I made a fist with a middle finger. I called him Vance the Vegan, and he was flipping the bird (pun intended) to everyone that was going to be eating other fowl.
A guitarist named Erik made the best one. He glued feathers on it, and a piece of dangling jewelry, draped from the neck. He said it was the turkeys bling.
We glanced at Ebers CD collection. Usually I notice people have a shelf filled with crappy DVDs (why do so many people own Independance Day?). He has one of the best CD collections I've ever seen (and he let me borrow his Zombies "Odyssey and Oracle").
It was still 45 minutes until the bird would be done, so I took my glass of wine into the backyard to enjoy a cigar. I could hear people showing up, saying hello, and asking Eber about the latest controversy involving his son. At one point I heard Eber say "I asked him if he has someone he runs these things by before he does them."
There were two different tables, and I'm positive ours had the more interesting conversation. A teacher from Encinitas had some great stories. Her husband, a tall guy with long hair and a drum shirt (he was another guitarist), talked about bands from his hometown, Detroit (I've never met someone from the Motor City that didn't love their Detroit bands; but in their defense, they have produced some great stuff).
There was one couple that had cute accents. The guy was from France, his wife from Iran. They met when he was her boss, and that led to a lot of great conversations about office romances and the various things we've all seen over the years.
I've never seen a better selection of desserts on Thanksgiving. Aside from the pumpkin and apple pies, and few other goodies...I loved the six different flavors of Ben & Jerry's set out.
With a slice of pie and chocolate brownie on top of it, my belt buckle snapped as the first spoonful entered my pumpkin pie hole.
There were people showing up as we were leaving. One woman said she had been to two places earlier. And I wondered how common it was for people to go to various relatives on turkey day. I figured they all met at one place. And if you were married, and there were two different families, you pick one and enjoy the day there. Maybe the following year, you can spend it with the other folks.
And there are some that will avoid their family at all costs. It's one of the reasons the premise of Four Christmas was so interesting. It was unfortunatley, not a good film.
oops :)
By KarenBP 6:39 p.m., Nov 27, 2009 > Report it
I saw Wicked for the first time this summer.. it was sooo awesome. Isn't it a musical and not a play?? ;-)
That sounds like the coolest Thanksgiving party ever.. I love how there were activities...and Vance the Vegan made me really laugh out loud.
By Crissyst 11:24 p.m., Nov 27, 2009 > Report it
My other comment was 86'd from your other version of this funny read, Josh.
Lovin' any mention of vegan, what can i say?
As for Butterball?
They're tref!!
Not a good kind of turkey for a Jewish family...
David Elliott (not the ex-U-T'er) and Empire were the ones we'd have... and kosher turkeys were ridiculously expensive. So much fo the (wrong) stereotype of Jews as miserly... we pay big time for Kosher food.
Sort of like vegan food that's ridiculously overpriced...
Speaking of Jewish stuff and Detroit, reminds me: "DETROIT ROCK CITY"... You gonna go see KISS?
Minus Peter Criss (he of "Beth" vocals), that is. And no Ace Frehley. Just the two Jews, Gene & Paul, and now Eric Singer (another MOT) and some other dude...
Lemme comment about office romances... uh, never mind.
:)
By KarenBP 12:27 a.m., Nov 28, 2009 > Report it
Ahhhh...so, Gene Simmons is Jewish. And he sells out the bands name for any product he can, even caskets.
No, I'm not much of a KISS fan. A few good songs. I saw them when I was 22. Nice pyrotechnic special effects. Once is enough with them.
(I have no clue what "tref" means)
You dang Vegans. The body needs protein and all those other things meat provides.
By JoshBoard 12:37 a.m., Nov 28, 2009 > Report it
tref means terrific?
By Ponzi 12:35 p.m., Nov 28, 2009 > Report it
Tref = not Kosher (Jewish dietary laws)
By KarenBP 8:48 p.m., Nov 28, 2009 > Report it
You Jews and your crazy rules!
Lambert just told me that last Thanksgiving, all he knew was that his son made the top 75, not the top 10. So, I guess I got that wrong. I could've sworn he said top 10, because if someone told me their son made the top 75 in ANYTHING, I wouldn't think it was a big deal. And I remembered thinking that we needed to watch Idol, to see him sing.
By JoshBoard 1:46 a.m., Nov 29, 2009 > Report it
i think Lambert's part Jew, too. i'm just sayin'...
By KarenBP 6:21 p.m., Nov 29, 2009 > Report it
Karen, my father is an Orthodox Jew and growing up I heard a lot of Yiddish. Hearing the word "tref" brought back a memory or three. I never took the time to learn Yiddish, just picked up things from my father. Then I learned something he knew but didn't teach me:
Gei kaken afen yam.
If you know what that means, you'll understand why my father wasn't too happy when I told him that in my teen rebellious years. But it sure felt good at the time. Ha!
As for the turkeys we had for Thanksgiving, I'm not sure what we had but I think after my father left us in a very ugly way, my Conservative Jewish mother started buying Butterballs out of spite. It could also be because just as Karen mentioned, the kosher stuff is pricey. I like to think my mother's spite is the reason. More fun that way.
By Adam92102 11:29 p.m., Nov 29, 2009 > Report it
I made a mistake once of going into the Ralph's next to the theatre in La Jolla. I thought I'd buy a snack there cheaper than the theatre, and my friend was still 15 minutes away, so I had time to kill.
I see chocolate covered raisins and bring them to the register. Imagine my surprise when she tells me the price was something like $8.50. I asked "Did you ring this up properly?"
She was on the phone talking to someone (which some would find rude...I liked her being able to multi-task in perfect fashion; I had watched her handle a group of rowdy kids in front of me while on the phone, in a very speedy manner...but I digress).
She put her hand over the phone and said "Those are Jewish...and, their candies that we sell here are a lot more."
Now, the insecure Jew in me, thought that if I tell her no (as a Zombie might), everyone in line would think I was a cheap skate. And so, I bit the bullet and bought the things.
When I was sharing them with my friend I said "You better have enjoyed those. You ate $5 worth of raisins and chocolate."
By JoshBoard 1:27 a.m., Nov 30, 2009 > Report it