Tag: Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has always been a big deal for the Holliday family – in 2000 I was working in Singapore, but embarked on the 17 hour one-way flight just to be home for two days during the holiday. Since then the Thanksgiving travel has been less extreme, but no matter what it takes everyone still sits down in front of a giant turkey that my mom will inevitably say will be too dry or too overdone – this year’s bird somehow ended up cooking upside-down, which my mom was convinced would ruin it; it was delicious, as always.

The 2015 Thanksgiving odyssey started out Wednesday before noon when I finished up a half day of work and Audrey and I attempted to beat LA traffic. “Beating” LA traffic is an impossibility, but it wasn’t quite the nightmare that it could have been and we only sat in traffic jams for about thirty minutes before we were out of the city’s boundaries. Our lunch stop in the Central Valley was crowded beyond belief – the line was around the counter, past the door, and through the eating area – so plan B ended up being Subway and a few bags of trail mix from the gas station convenience store. Many more miles of driving took us to Harris Ranch, site of the “salt pie” of Thanksgiving 2011 fame. After seven-and-a-half total hours of driving, including a detour along a curvy road in the hills above Livermore, our journey finally ended in Concord with Audrey slightly carsick but otherwise unharmed.

The following day on Thanksgiving morning, Aaron and I headed off for a hike on Mount Diablo, and he won the animal-spotting contest by finding a very seasonal flock of wild turkeys eating someone’s yard near our trailhead. The jaunt through the woods was followed by a day of much lounging, a delicious meal of much gluttony, and finally a card game that involved much losing on my part. Post-Thanksgiving we joined Ma & Pa for breakfast, made a brief visit to the Cosumnes River Preserve, and then visited Aaron’s new place in Sacramento before spending an evening out in downtown Sacramento and a night in a downtown hotel. Today we braved traffic back home – the seven hour return trip was long, but nothing compared to a flight from halfway around the world. With any luck next year will be much the same, and the Holliday family Thanksgiving tradition will continue.

“I never imagined we’d be hanging out in the parlor, and that Aaron was gonna take his shirt off”. And that was just the beginning of our Thanksgiving weekend.

Audrey and I escaped LA before noon on Wednesday and missed the true joy of Thanksgiving traffic, but it was still a couple of hours to get out of the city limits, and an occasional stop-and-go drive for three hundred miles thereafter. After a steak dinner at Harris Ranch (we were inspired by the seven million cows) we picked up a salt and pumpkin pie (they failed to mention that they were using salt instead of sugar this year), and got home just in time to join the folks for beers and a lovely evening of my brother with his shirt off.

Thanksgiving day saw everyone take a try at balancing on the exercise ball before stuffing ourselves with non-salted pie and turkey. Friday saw the traditional post-Thanksgiving Cocos breakfast and delicious Chow’s wontons, followed by a drive to Moss Beach to see Audrey’s friend and some imbibing on the cliffs next to the ocean as the sun set. Four cats, much sneezing, and fifty miles later and we were in Cupertino for the night, and we woke up a block away from my old office at HP. Audrey couldn’t visit Cupertino without posing with her iPad at the Apple Headquarters (I still like her), and then it was south to Gilroy to buy garlic products. Much driving later we arrived in the middle of nowhere to search out giant white pelicans in the Central Valley (who knew?) before driving off into the sunset and heading home.

Now comes four weeks of work, including two trips to Boise, before Christmas and two weeks of vacation. This time last year I was off on the Banjo Tour, so the winter of 2011 may not be quite so exciting, but hopefully at least one of December’s entries will be from somewhere on the road.

My two-entries-a-month goal has failed miserably. Here’s the summary for November:

Thanksgiving in the Bay Area was filled with the usual uncontrollable laughter, including the revelation that the Skipper and Aaron once had a pickle-eating contest that ended disastrously. Audrey joined us for the first time this year and confessed to a sore stomach after the multi-hour laughfest. Even Ryan Sutherland got in on the act, filling us all in on the Infomercial marketing wonder that is Booty Pops. In less interesting news the latest major version of JAMWiki was released on November 3, and surprisingly there haven’t been any reports that it caused some poor user’s computer to burst into flaming wreckage. And in news that is in no way related to me, SpaceX may be able to launch their new Falcon 9 rocket as early as next February, although March is probably a safer bet.

Two weeks without an update is very poor form – my apologies. The only excuse I can offer is that the recent move from Studio City (home of CBS studios) to Culver City (home of Sony studios) has been busy. Here’s a recap:

Pre-Thanksgiving

Each day was pretty much the same: wake up, then spend the day helping Audrey sort stuff, move large items, and list crap on craigslist. Afterwards, deal with the two million people who call to ask if they can pick something up, and then meet the four who might actually show up. In fairness I had a bunch of fun with the craigslist minions, and as the previous posting mentioned met a bunch of odd characters.

Thanksgiving Weekend

Drove home, then went with Aaron to look at Toyota Tacomas. Our testing of the vehicle included the “lie down in the back and pretend to eat chowder” exam, and some time driving around the parking lot with a sales guy who kept mumbling something about “my damn Lexus”. Afterwards we met Chi and the Tall Guy at Chow before finishing the night with a game of Balderdash. The Turkey Bowl the next morning was a massacre, with a final score in the 77 to 42 range. Losing Bowerbank before the half killed us, although Nick’s trail of tears play somewhat made up for the embarrassing loss. Kev (who surprised everyone by showing up at Aaron Field at 7:30, almost three hours before kickoff) and Chi joined us for dinner, and Sally again outdid herself. The next morning I woke up at 4:30 so that Aaron and I could chase down the mad dealz at Circuit City, although when we arrived the line stretched across the front of the store, down the length of the parking lot, and onto the sidewalk, so we apparently weren’t the only idiots to get up early. The rest of the weekend was relatively uneventful, although Lynn and I had a nice drive back to Los Angeles, with a much-needed burger stop along the way.

Post-Thanksgiving

Audrey and I rented a giant U-Haul for Monday, and my job was to find two movers to help out. One of them called to cancel while we were picking up the truck, but luckily there was a group of about fifteen day-laborers standing around outside of the U-Haul office. As we walked out Audrey whispered “get a big one” in my ear, and this proved sage advice as Jose not only worked amazingly hard, but schlepped around items that I thought might be a chore for two people. His constant grunts of “muy fuerte” were both amusing and appropriate. By the time the day ended we had completely filled and then emptied a twenty-six foot long truck, but the new place is great so it was quite worthwhile. The next day was spent piling remaining items from the old house onto the lawn with a giant “FREE!” sign, and while I’m sure this display of communal trash dumping might have upset the neighbors, it introduced us to the special breed of craigslist stealth ninjas, who showed up unseen at all hours to remove completely random items — while our TV cabinet was still on the lawn the next morning, its glass door apparently caught someone’s fancy.