Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, the big Turkey day is here. Though I am alone this holiday, I am not lonely.

I had a great Thanksgiving dinner with my family earlier this week. A few of us work in casinoes and have to work on holidays. So we get together on an off day for Christmas and Thanksgiving. There were 12 of us gathered in my sister's house. She makes a lot of money as a cocktail waitress and real estate agent and she went all out and refurbished her house. Her bedroom and bathroom are works of art. Well, she and my mother cooked a bounty of food. My daughter brought over cherry and apple pie. I brought my appettite. I nearly ruined my dinner eating the snacks: guacamole and salsa were my favorites.
Three of my kids showed up. Their brother is stuck in Memphis at the university with only a couple days off for the holiday. My brother has three boys who had a great time talking with my kids. Some of us watched Gonzaga beat Virginia (not sure if it was VA). I stuffed myself almost til it hurt. My two younger kids and I played Texas Hold 'em. I wiped them out. My youngest son has been watching all the stupid poker shows on cable and is excited about it. As we were playing I recalled to them how I taught them to play 7 card stud when they were real young. My daughter cried the first time someone bluffed her. She couldn't get over the fact that someone would lie to her. It was a precious moment. I made him give her money back. Poor little innocent soul. But not that night, I took her chips gladly.

So, I get up this morning at 4 am and get ready for work. I drive out of the neighborhood and am thinking about getting coffee at Starbucks when it dawns on me that it is Thanksgiving day and I'm off! So, I made a quick left turn to the local Starbucks and hung out there for about three hours reading my favorite book and the NY Times. They had a front page article discussing the Vatican's directive on gays in seminaries. I was relieved that there wasn't an all out ban on gays becoming priests. It seems to be directed at active gays who wouldn't or couldn't control their impulses. It seemed to me that the recent directives were mainly a rehashing of guidelines that have been around since the sixties.

Anyway, I enjoyed watching the people getting their coffee with each of their different lives. One happy young woman was talking about how I simply must visit Dublin. I must take the ferry from London to Dublin. The only problem is I think both those cities are inland. Hmm, I know London is but lemme check out Ireland's map. *** Ok, Dublin is on the coast. London is inland but there is an inlet that comes close to London. Maybe one travels there and catches the ferry. You have to sail around southern England to get to Dublin, though. *** Yes, the Thames river becomes an inlet that leads to the sea. Google is an amazing site.
Then I talked to an elderly man who was chatting about visiting Ireland with us. He said he wasn't a world traveler but that one can take these kinds of trips without it breaking the bank. I told him I have a friend in Ireland who could put me up.

Well, then I went back to the house I am house sitting while my best friend, Mark, is off on a family vacation in Hawaii. I grabbed his labrador mix and drove out to the Redrock Canyon area. I went to one of our favorite places. We made up our own names for the topography. I entered through the Gully of God's Goodness followed some of the burro trails and then tramped up a dry riverbed to the Beautiful Valley past God's Cannonball and the haunted yucca forest (remember Vegas is in a desert) and rested at Chris's Crack. Poor Drooper was exhausted by the time we got back to my car. I opened the car door and instead of jumping in he laid down on the ground to rest his sore muscles. I had to command him to jump in. We came back home and he drank his whole bowlful of water. Poor dog is getting old. He needs more exercise.

So, I drank some water myself and drove over here to Webjoy where I just played a couple games of online spades with my distant son in Memphis. He is without a place to go today, too. His friend who invited him over for dinner got sick and wasn't going to go. He gave me a virtual hug as we said goodbye. I liked that... very much. Then I IM'd my Mexican friend who is studying in Canada. He is fixing on getting drunk tonight so he can compose more of a poem he is working on. I forgot to tell him I just wrote one last night about the tears of St. Monica. I'll post it here like I promised. I wrote a poetic tribute to my dad the day he died when I was drunk on Tequila. I was surprised how well it came out considering the circumstances.

Well, that's it for now. Hope you had a warmhearted Thanksgiving day.