I don’t know how it happened, but Thanksgiving is upon us! I’m so woefully unprepared, and that’s due to everything being so damn busy this month. At least I remembered to take the turkey out of the freezer on Sunday!

Earlier this month, my brothers and sisters and I threw a 50th Wedding Anniversary party for our parents. It was also my Mom’s 70th birthday, so we threw that celebration in with it too. It was a lot of planning by my family, and it tuned out great. We had an open house in the church basement in Mn Lake from 1-4, then after my parents forced us to go to Mass, we went out to the farm for a family-only celebration (with beer!). Had so much fun catching up with aunts, uncles and cousins that I haven’t had a chance to talk to for years. But, that was a whirlwind of activity and it took time to recover! I still haven’t gotten the pictures off the digital camera. Must do that this week before we go down to Mankato on Saturday for Thanksgiving.

At work, we moved floors to move closer to our committee chair. So that involved us packing up everything in offices and desks (and cleaning/throwing things out) in the span of about 6 days in addition to the ever increasing workload (two big events and year-end coming up). Needless to say, the past two weeks have FLOWN by, which explains why I just realized that Thanksgiving is tomorrow and that I don’t have everything I need to make dinner.

Luckily, I picked up all the stuff I needed from Trader Joe’s last week when we made a run over there. However, I still need to go to Cub to get those basics that I need to make stuff. You know, onions, milk, eggs…those things. And I can’t forget the ubiquitous jellied cranberry sauce. You know, the one that retains the shape of the can it comes in? I know it’s tacky and trashy and that a lot of people sort of turn their noses up at it, but for me, it’s not Thanksgiving without a couple cans of that gelled goodness.

I also was going to cop out and just pick up a ready-made pumpkin pie at the store, but Tim and I decided the last thing we need calorie-wise was an entire pie for the two of us to eat. We’ll get enough sweets this weekend at the family Thanksgiving.

Now, due to the fact that I’m certifiably insane, I’m running in the Lifetime Fitness Turkey Day 5k tomorrow. I’m meeting a bunch of co-workers from Ye Olde Part Tyme Jobbe at 7:15am* then running in the freezing cold for 3.1 miles. THEN, I’m going home to cook the turkey. Originally, I planned on putting the turkey in when I left, but as it’s only a 8lb turkey breast, putting the turkey on at 6:30am would make it be done around 10:30, which is too early for me to get home from the 5k and prep the rest of the dinner. So, I’m going to start it when I get home and we’ll have Thanksgiving dinner around 2pm.

I’m quite thankful I get to leave early today and hopefully (*fingers crossed*) the store won’t be too insane at 4:30pm. Ah, who am I kidding? I’ll be lucky to get out of Cub without killing someone. Will someone post my bail if I do?

I’m also thankful for my awesome family, a great future with the love of my life and for three happy, healthy kitties. We’ve been fighting issues** with all three of ‘em lately, so hopefully we’ll see that settle down soon.

Wishing you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving!

* – getting up before 7am ON A HOLIDAY when I don’t have to be awake until whenever I want to? To go run OUTSIDE in NOVEMBER? Call the wagon now, kids.

** – we HOPEFULLY found a food*** that won’t aggravate Chester’s allergies, but in the meantime he’s having skin issues (because it takes 2-3 weeks of a new food to see any difference) and the girls are having digestive…um…”issues” to the new food. Again, this should be temporary while they get used to the new food. Yes, I know you’re supposed to GRADUALLY introduce the new food. But as Chester wouldn’t eat the old food, but would scarf the new food, the girls would do the same thing, thus leaving 1/2 full bowls of the old food. Little bastards.

*** – because the company that makes the wet food (venison + green pea) we feed him doesn’t make a DRY version of it, despite the fact the other three flavors (Chicken, Duck or Salmon + Green Pea) in the limited ingredient line have both a wet and dry version. Naturally, Chester won’t eat any of the other three flavors’ dry version. Asshole.