Friday, November 24, 2017

Free For All Friday: A Little Throw It Out Thursday Gets Accomplished In This Thanksgiving/Dog Show Recap


Did you all have a pleasant Thanksgiving or Thursday or both? It was important to me that I take the day off from Something, so Writing was that Something. Truth be told, I also took the day off from Behaving Myself a little bit, and did quite a bit of Curse-Filled Pontificating And Narrating during the Dog Show. Once again, my most favourite dog in the universe, the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever did NOT win, nor did it get any camera time beyond its speedy introduction as part of the Sporting Group. To add Insult to Injury, the Brussels Griffon won Best In Show, and I was completely outraged. Here, you tell me:

Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever
This dog did not win.

Ugly Brussels Griffon Icky Thing Dog
This one did.

I think my point is made.  I only hope the Canadians don't take it personally and stop making wine for me in Ontario.

This Thanksgiving taught me that, in addition to Throwing Out some pretty good Swear Words and Rants Against Lesser Dogs, I could also Throw Out the following:

1. Rolls
2. A second vegetable side dish

I fussed and fumed about not finding The Good Rolls this year, and went on a ridiculous 3-Store Hunt for them. After finally securing this coveted item and putting out said Good Rolls on the Thanksgiving Table, they were assiduously ignored and forgotten, left untouched to be put away, pristine and puffy, likely to be frozen for less festive meals in the future.  I also made the Executive Decision to serve only one vegetable--Jared's sauteed Brussels sprouts (the best thing from Brussels, ahem!) with onions and balsamic glaze--and it was more than enough.

So, to recap, here's What I Threw Out On Thanksgiving Thursday:
1.  Lots Of Indiscriminate Profanity Directed At Dog Breeds And Dog Show Judging
2.  Any Notion Of Ever Serving Rolls (Even The Good Kind) At Thanksgiving Dinner
3.  The Idea That A Second Vegetable Dish Was Necessary
Oh, and--
4.  All Pretense That I Can Make "A Lot Less" Stuffing

We were one less at the Dept. for dinner this year since Sam was vacationing in warmer climes.  I was determined to make A Lot Less Stuffing.  I still have NO IDEA why this did not happen.  I truly feel like I did not buy the same amount of ingredients I used to; I honestly feel that I mixed, chopped, sauteed, and seasoned way less.  YET, when I finished shaping the little balls of stuffing, I still had three pans full of them.  Each and every time I had to get out another pan, I was stunned and amazed.

I was not even drinking. No lie.

Speaking of drinking, we served two wines with dinner, an oaked Chardonnay and an unfiltered Pinot Noir, both lightly chilled.  And both Canadian. 


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20 comments:

  1. I hope I can find a rerun of the dog show. I like Golden Retrievers better than your favorite but all the retrievers are great dogs.

    We had two vegetable dishes but there was so much food we had lots of left overs. My niece always packs up take-home contains (that she buys for holidays and parties) and divided up everything for when the guest all leave. I love it.

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    1. Jean--You might be able to find it online at ABC.com. I get annoyed when they don't show the entire dog show, just a few select breeds that end up in the top of the group. The Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever didn't place in the top four for the Sporting Group, so they didn't even show its judging. But there were some lovely dogs; the American Staffordshire Terrier was a particularly good-looking one for its breed. We all thought it would win.

      Jared went home with leftovers also. I tried to send home more with him, but he is very careful with his diet.

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    2. Jean! The dog show is being rerun tonight at 8 on NBC. I was mistaken; it was not even on ABC. But you can watch it in its entirety this evening on regular network TV. YAY!

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  2. We were with friends and we saw the Brussels Griffon win. No one among us was pleased. I like your wine selections, but didn't know that Chardonnay could be from Canada. About the stuffing... well, maybe the bread expanded when while you were sneering at the dog show. It could happen!

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    1. Ally Bean--I'm glad to hear that I am not the only one who was irked by the Dog Show Results.

      Chardonnay vines are here in Ohio, too, but not with very good results. The vine clones are grafted onto heartier root stocks. Chardonnay is grown/made all over the US and in Canada, along with other varietals. And now I'm done teaching wine.

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  3. Our family dinner went off very well (with one small glitch which I will share on my blog later). We took ham & green beans & amazingly most of the green beans were eaten. My dad always provides to-go containers for our meals - mine had cake, brownies, cranberry jello salad, corn pudding, banana pudding, and about an acre of persimmon pudding. One might think that I was on a soft food diet. Ha!

    I was so exhausted & tired of people by the end that I just came home & crocheted.

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    1. Bug--Or a Sweets Diet. You blew it by not bringing home entrees. Now someone has to cook Real Food the next few days.

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  4. Sorry, the good rolls are mandatory at Thankgiving. At least for us. There were only 7 of us this year, and I think maybe 3 of us ate rolls, but they were IMPORTANT.

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    1. J@jj--We each have our Priorities. I think The Good Rolls should continue to make an appearance at your table as long as someone still eats them. This year, they proved that they Cannot Make The Cut at mine anymore. They had a good run.

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  5. You made me laugh once again. We seemed to have more stuffing than anything else, why is that? Does it multiply when we are not looking?

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    1. Meredith--I always make some extra because the boys love it cold left over, so they each take some home. But I think you may be onto something with your theory. I can't explain it otherwise.

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  6. My favorite dog is a Bernese Mountain Dog. Second favorite are greyhounds, which I would love to rescue one but we can't have a dog here as we have no grass in the backyard.

    The expressions on the faces of the dogs in the header photo are KILLING me.

    My husband had to patrol on Thanksgiving, so we had a Thanksgiving breakfast out, which was highly disappointing. Never again! Then, the three of us brought dessert to him later on in the afternoon and shared it with him on his dinner hour. It was nice! The rest of my family was in Arizona, and who knows where my husband's family was.

    I am glad your Thanksgiving was lovely, although I am sure you missed your son. Your family is also much different than mine because we love our bread, and it is often the first thing to go. I would have totally eaten your good rolls!

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    1. Gina--Oh, I had a long-running affair early on with the Bernese Mt. Dog years and years ago. They are gorgeous and smiley and floppy. Did you know they have a very short life span? Jared also loves the greyhounds.

      I'm glad you still had a family meal on Tgiving since your husband had to work. Such a nice gesture even if it didn't meet expectations.

      We did miss Sam, but surprised ourselves by behaving and not talking a bunch of smack about him when he couldn't be there to defend himself. ;-) I will thaw out some Good Rolls for homemade turkey soup next week.

      (Didn't I luck out finding that header image? Could NOT pass it up!)

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  7. Oh we have ham for days - we’ve already had several meals off it. Although today (still at the beach) we picked up some teriyaki chicken to go with the corn pudding. We’re about tired of ham. :)

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  8. Well, now you know how it feels.Sorry your Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever didn't win but I'm having a hard time feeling bad about that .Do you remember when you disqualified my Panthera Leo from your contest because you said he wasn't cute enough? Now we are even.

    So, on to your Rick and I gaffe. When I read that, Nance, honest to God my hair hurt.Good for John for mentioning it to you. I was going to let you slide this once but now that it's out in the open and you are a defrocked English teacher, I can tell the World that you should be given a second chance because you gave my Panthera Leo a new opportunity to win your contest. Of course,he didn't win so he just came home with my friend and I...

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    1. Nancy--Wow. "Defrocked"? I am having a Dimmesdale moment.

      But if it afforded you an opportunity to show up in Comments, then I suppose it was worth it.

      Delete
  9. Some year I'm actually going to make an effort to bet tickets to the Dog Show - and see them all for myself, for as long as I want to!

    And I believe 100% that there is no such thing as Less Stuffing.

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    1. Bridget--That sounds like it could be wonderful...for you. I would be a Snark Risk, absolutely. Especially when it came to certain members of the Terrier Group and pretty much all members of the Toy Group.

      Re Stuffing: I believe it now, too.

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  10. This seems to be payoff time in our relationship...You didn't like it when I said you were defrocked..Remember the time that you kicked me off your site because I mentioned my cactus twice? You ripped the buttons off my coat,slapped my face and challenged me to a duel.Eventually you allowed me back but only on condition that I would never mention the cactus again. Well, I have sneaked that word into your blog twice in one comment.. Want to duel?

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    1. Nancy--Wow. None of that happened and this post is about Thanksgiving and the dog show. Yikes.

      Delete

Oh, thank you for joining the fray!

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