Thanksgiving, Part I: An Early Start

Thanksgiving began a little earlier than usual at my house this year. On Wednesday, I took a late afternoon nap, and when I woke up, the clock read "5:45."   I panicked. Guests were coming to my house at 1 p.m. to eat Thanksgiving dinner, and I knew I had to get the large turkey ready and into the oven so it could roast slowly.

The 24-pound turkey had been thawing in the refrigerator downstairs for a couple of days, but I worried that it might still be frozen in the middle. Endangering limb, if not life, I scrambled downstairs and wrestled the turkey back upstairs and into a roasting pan. The cats scattered as I grabbed a large knife and chopped onions, garlic, and celery like a mad woman, then added them to the roasting pan, and jammed the whole thing into the oven. 

Thank goodness the guests were bringing the rest of the food: pumpkin pie, sweet potatoes, salads, etc. I readied the plates and silverware so the table could be set as soon as everyone arrived.

It was while the cranberry sauce was cooking that I noticed that although it was now nearly seven o'clock, it wasn't getting any lighter outside. Slowly, came the dawn (pun intended): it was 7 p.m. Wednesday evening, not 7 a.m. Thursday morning.

The up-side of this is that the next morning (the real Thanksgiving Day), all I had to do was put the turkey back in the oven and turn it on.