Turkey N'At

Since I spent Thanksgiving with a real live Western PA family, I decided I should use a Western PA-ism in my title. (N'at is their version of "and everything." Don't worry, no one actually used this terminology yesterday.)

I almost didn't make my punch because I didn't feel like going to the grocery store. But there wasn't anything in the house that could magically morph into something people would want to eat for Thanksgiving and that could feed more than 3 people. Plus once I got to the grocery store, I was going to take the easy way out and buy a potted plant or a bouquet, but they were too expensive for the quality of plant. Punch it is! And it was a hit! Yay!

After the grocery store, I make my punch, then wash the hair (ugh) and watch "Brown Sugar" while twisting it up. Then it's time to leave. I head to ST's house. When I get there, the punch has spilled!! Son of a!! Get that cleaned up, then head to his mom's house. When my families (my mom has a knack of getting adopted by all of her friends' families, so I have lots of families in Charlotte) do Thanksgiving, there are 7 million extended relatives and people everywhere. It was me, ST, his parents, grandma, sister and sister's boyfriend.

Everyone was so fun and nice. Here's the menu: turkey, homemade mashed potatoes (important distinction because I don't do mashed potatoes out of a box. Potato flakes? No.), corn, cranberry sauce, yams, stuffing, biscuits, regular and mushroom gravy, pumpkin pie, and apple pie. I was so happy it was good. I did learn that I'm not a fan of pumpkin pie. It tastes okay but I'm a sweet potato girl even though I don't like yams. Turns out ST is the oldest and favored child of the family. (Sounds familiar lol) His mom had made a small personal pie for him to take home with him. WOW!! I would never leave the area, either if my mom cooked for me all the time! Sent home personalized portions and stuff. Lol.

After dinner, me and ST headed to the casino. I'd never been to a casino before. LAWD!! EVERYONE looks like their spending their last dime there. Smokers, missing teeth, coughing, in wheelchairs, on oxygen tanks. As we walked out, we saw a blind man WITH A GUIDE DOG!! ST says, "Does that mean you're addicted." That's EXACTLY what that means. Wow. First we do the 25 cent machines and I keep winning-- only $2 or so, but enough to keep me sitting at that machine for 10 minutes and only putting in $2. Then we go to the 5 cent machines. Not as lucky. I play $5 quickly on this one. (I'd given myself a $12 budget). After that I head to the penny slots. This one. MAAAAAAN!! I kept winning for real. I put in $5 and every time I hit the button to spin, I won something. I was getting bored and not feeling the cigarette smoke so once I got up to $10.70, I got up to leave. Know what that means? My net loss was only $1.30. Yay casino! The one in Pittsburgh isn't supposed to open until 2009 at the earliest but it will be 2/3 smoke-free. Smoke-free casinos for everyone!

I was going to go shopping today. I really considered it and did look online a bit, but since it started snowing OUT OF NOWHERE as we walked into the casino last night, then stopped, I had a feeling it'd snow overnight. I look out the window and the grass is covered, the pine trees, and there's 1/2 inch to an inch on my car. Why does it snow every Thanksgiving here? That's not cute! So no shopping today. I probably won't leave my house until I have to go to work tonight. (Typical Friday).

Project Runway Recap on the Record Dish.