moriath

Having an extremely low-key Christmas this year - it's Billy's and my first Christmas by ourselves, and of course we're poor. I got him a movie "gift basket" (a bunch of candy and a gift card to the movies in a tub of microwave popcorn), so later today we're going to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

He got me a six foot cardboard cut out of Captain Jack Sparrow, lol. I won't get it for a few days, but he put together a box filled with clues (six shoes, a pirate figure, a Jack Sparrow picture, and a piece of cardboard) so I could figure it out.

My parents also gave us $150 to spend as we see fit. I think I'm going to put some of it towards wedding-related expenses, and go get a MAC makeover sometime soon so I can do my makeup for the wedding.

I've got garlic roasting in the oven right now. OMG it smells delicious.

My dad's sister and her husband are in jail. For using/making/distributing crystal meth.

As if that's not awesome enough? They also had a three hour standoff with the police.

And people wonder why that side of the family isn't invited to the wedding?

Anyone else have crazy family Thanksgiving stories?

Everything from my to-do list earlier? It's done! Well, today's list. I wasn't able to get a real head start on my cooking, since upon re-reading my recipes there's really nothing I can make ahead. So I did my prep work (there are lots of little containers of chopped veggies in my fridge) and will have a mad cooking rush tomorrow afternoon. Something is going to turn out less-than-stellar - I poorly planned the side-dish choices, so everything is going to have to attempt to cook at once. And I only have one pan that actually fits in my oven (I knew I should have picked up those aluminum pans at the grocery store tonight...damn me and my cheapskate ways!)

The one thing I did get to make tonight was the rolls. I used good old Pillsbury. Except I've never actually baked Pillsbury rolls before, so I had unwrapped the cannister, and then I was just staring at it, trying to figure out how the hell I was supposed to get at the rolls inside when it suddenly POPPED and exploded open in my hands.

It entertained me so much that I decided to make a double batch of rolls, so that I could make the cannister pop again, but it pre-emptively exploded so I still didn't get to fully enjoy the popping experience :-(

I also burned the bottoms of the rolls a little. I R cooking failure :-(

Hopefully this isn't a bad omen about how my first Thanksgiving feast experience is going to turn out.

A random collection of thoughts on a dreary Tuesday morning afternoon:

-I think I figured out how I'm cooking the cornish game hens for Thanksgiving. I have a recipe in my Dr. Suess cookbook for Who-Roast-Beast which calls for stuffing mushrooms under the skin of a fryer chicken. Assuming that the hens have skin, I think I'm going this route so I can say I've eaten Who-Roast-Beast

-My mom is officially coming to visit December 7-9. Yay! Hopefully work is giving me that time off (requested it yesterday). Now I need to figure out some stuff for us to do.

-WEIRD dream last night/this morning. Dunkin' Donuts was doing some sort of donut sampler promotion, where you'd get to try one of each of their donuts. Billy and I would go there with Chris and Misty (even though they're in Ohio and we're in New York...) and we would each order a sampler. This meant we ended up with 24 donuts between 4 people. I never ate more than one at any given sitting (we went there at least three times in the dream).

Some morning I need to wake up early enough to go to Dunkin' Donuts for breakfast (the last two times I've been awake early enough to justify going out to buy breakfast, Billy has been awake, too, and we've gone to our new favorite diner. Mmm, diner)

-I am so far behind on the invitations it's not even funny. I might have to re-order some paper 'cause some of these things may be irreparably screwed up. Oy.

So Billy and I are spending our first Thanksgiving together, which means I have to prepare a feast! Here's the current plan:

Cornish Game Hens (getting a turkey for two people was ridiculous, and this seemed more "festive" in Billy's words than getting just a turkey breast)
These amazing Crash hot potatoes
Assorted roasted vegetables (right now I'm thinking eggplant, radish and broccoli)
Cranberry Sauce (courtesy of Ocean Spray, the only way to eat it)
Pumpkin Pie (courtesy of Cucina & Co, 'cause there's only so much I can make in my tiny kitchen)
Some sort of roll (perhaps homemade?)
Possibly mashed sweet potatoes (had these for the first time at my grandmother's last year and they were delicious. I need to figure out if I can replicate them)

Also, we're going to buy some special gushy foodz for the cats so they can celebrate Thanksgiving with us, too.

In non-food related news, today I give thanks to Billy's parents, for buying us a real live bed as an early Christmas present. It arrived today and it is wonderful :-) All the cats have been camped out on it all day, so they approve as well.

I finally sat down last night and finished cutting out the first part of our wedding invitations. That took way too long - I want to send them out by the end of this month and I am far, far from finishing them. So I'm going to grab myself a snack and then sit back down in front of the TV (or pop in the second Pirates movie. I finished the first batch of cutting while watching the first one. I seriously don't think I would ever accomplish anything without the help of these movies) to finish the next part. Provided my hand holds out.