My relationship with this particular turkey– bless his heart– began last Friday, one week ago.

Mr. Big Food had asked me to go to Kroger and procure a $0.78 / pound turkey of approximately 15-16-20 pounds. And so I did. Eventually. After some thought, we opted for the 20.25 pound bird, as opposed to the much smaller 16.75 one.

I am here to tell you, as “Smoked Turkey Gumbo Friday” winds to a close, that those extra 3 1/2 pounds do make a difference.

The bird was frozen when he arrived at the Farm. He went straight into a roaster which was put– on account of space considerations– into the fridge in the Bunkhouse. (Thus began the week-long rearranging of fridge/freezer contents that continues on as I write at ~9:15pm on Friday as Kat & the Successful Deer Hunter are finding room for the deer meat in my freezer.)

It took me a while to finally get the Thanksgiving day table looking the way I wanted it to look. Daughter C was very critical– and rightly so– of earlier iterations.

Speaking of Daughter C… . Here’s the snack spread that welcomed C, Jordan, and that Long-Haired Hippy Dog.

It was not unlike– in fact it was identical to– the one which welcomed Kat & Tony!

Here’s the point– and yes! there are more photos of how to have an elegant Thanksgiving (where the df of “elegant” is always up for grabs, and was, in fact, talked about yesterday)– I am having a wonderful Thanksgiving Day weekend with my family.

I hope you are, too.

Here’s to Stanley Miles!!