I met the Gerbers in Manhattan on Thanksgiving after they left the Macy's parade. They had planned to watch the parade at the apartment of friends who live along the parade route, as they'd done in years past, but they didn't consider that the hotel they'd stayed in overnight was on the other side of the parade from their friends' place. So they got stuck on that side of the street and couldn't get to their indoor viewing spot. So they had to watch it outside. They were also on the other side of the parade route from our rendezvous location, outside the McDonald's at 71st and Amsterdam, so I had to wait for them for about 20 minutes after Tracey called to tell me they weren't able to get here from there.
We also had to wait a while to get the car from the nearby parking garage where the Gerbers had left it the day before. So the boys and I started a game of Mario Party DS, and Tracey went to the McDonald's to get something for everyone to nosh on. I said I didn't want anything because I've got an avoid-McDonald's policy. The fries did smell terrific, though. I had a few bites of the chocolate, pretzel-shaped danishes the Gerbers had bought, among other things, to take to their friends' apartment. And when we got to the Gerbers' house, I had some Concord grapes I'd bought, along with some Cameo apples, at the Union Square Greenmarket the night before to bring to the Gerbers'. I'd forgotten that Concords aren't seedless, which is kind of a pain in the butt. They've got terrific flavor, though.
As regular readers of Hawleyblog may recall, the past two years, the Gerbers treated me to a fun show before we had our Thanksgiving dinner. This year, not so much. *sigh* :-)
We played some fun games, though. First, all five of us played Whoonu, which involves giving cards that have the names of various activities and items on them to one player at a time. That player, who doesn't know which player gave him which card, ranks them in order of how much she likes them. The person who gave her the card she ranked as the best gets a token worth 4 points. (In our case, because there were five players.) The person who gave her the card ranked as second best gets a token worth 3 points, and so on down to 1. After everyone has had a turn being the person whom cards are handed to, who's called the Whoozit, the person with the most points wins. We played several rounds of this game, which goes very fast. You have to know about the other players' likes and dislikes, but it's also a lot about luck: Whoever had the card with Malls on it in his four-card hand knew he had a winner when it got to be my sister's turn to collect others' cards. :-) I once drew a card with Spiders on it, and it sat in my hand the whole game.
The second game could be played by only four players, so David sat that one out. It was The Dangerous Book for Boys Game. This one was a rather complex board game that the Gerbers hadn't played before, so we had to read the instructions to figure out what we were doing. I don't think we had everything figured out because there was a swimming area around the main, island part of the game board, and we couldn't find anything in the instructions that explained when you would go to that outer ring. We assumed that one of the challenge cards that we never drew made you go swimming. *shrugs* The idea is to collect pieces of a raft that will allow you to sail off the island before the other players manage to do so. You gain pieces of the raft by successfully completing individual challanges or finishing group challenges before your opponents. We drew a lot of challenges involving putting planets in order from smallest to largest at the beginning, and that got pretty boring. But some of the other challenges were fun, like making a paper airplane and seeing who could throw his creation the farthest. (That would have been me. Ahem.) Along the way around the board, you could collect and retain helpful cards that could aid you in winning a particular challenge. For instance, you might get a card that showed the positions of stars in the constellation Ursa Minor. If someone drew a group-challenge (or you drew an individual-challenge) card that involved putting your star tokens in the layout of Ursa Minor, you were golden.
Tracey and I had some red wine while we were playing the games. At first, I had said I didn't want any wine because so far that day, all I'd consumed were a sweet muffin and coffee from Sweet Melissa, another coffee in Manhattan while I was waiting for the Gerbers to arrive, that chocolatey danish, and some grapes: nothing but sugar and caffeine. But pretty much all Tracey had to do to get me to drink with her was say "C'mon!" like Edna Krabappel.* I felt a little bit woozy that afternoon, but I managed to keep it together until dinner.
After the board and card games, the boys and I had a little time left to play some video games on the Wii. I'd gotten the boys Boom Blox for their birthday in August, and Thursday was the first time I'd tried it out. It's a lot of fun. We mostly played short games in which you have to knock down your opponents' structures before they knock down yours.
Dinner was great. We went to the Preakness Hills Country Club, where we've gone for Father's Day the past two years. I loaded up my plate with turkey and gravy, whipped sweet potatoes (I avoided the marshmallow topping because I'd had a ton of sugar already and I knew I'd be hitting the dessert table), roasted butternut squash with apples (and, I think, celery root, though the little sign didn't mention that), stuffing, and cranberry sauce. After I took the photo above, one of the boys asked me whether I take a picture of everything I eat. Only the unusual stuff or a particularly good meal that I made for myself or got at a restaurant, I said. I mean, come on, who would take a picture of everything he ate and expect someone to want to read about it?
After a pretty lengthy break, I went back to try the mashed potatoes with goat cheese and figs, which I was a little afraid of the first time I went up to the buffet. I had no reason to fear. I might have preferred more traditional mashed taters, but these were good, with a nice tang from the goat cheese. I couldn't detect the presence of figs.
I had a fine glass of pinot noir with dinner, but I have no idea who the producer was. And I drank green tea with a half piece of pumpkin pie (Matt had already taken the other half) and a bite of my sister's chocolate chip cookie for dessert.
The past few times I've seen the boys, I've corrected them whenever they've said "much" when they've meant "many." On Thursday, while we were playing the Wii, I told one of the guys—I think it was Mike—that I didn't understand what he was saying when he asked me a question using "much" when he meant "many." And I think it was in the car during the ride home from Manhattan that one of them used "much" incorrectly, and I told the guys: "You have to get it right. Otherwise, you'll be sitting in the Harvard admissions officer's office and you'll start to ask, 'How much classes ... ' and he'll cut you off and tell you there's no way he's going to let you into Harvard if you don't know the difference between 'much' and 'many.'" On the way to the train station, one of them screwed it up again, and I said, "Here's how you remember the difference: You'd ask, 'How much does Daddy stink before he takes a shower?' but you'd ask, 'How many glasses of wine did Mommy and Uncle Bill drink today?'" I think they've got it now!
The boys had some fun with the Koi Pond application I bought for my iPhone for 99 cents the other day. It's a cute little time waster that lets you splash your fingers around in a customizable ... wait for it ... koi pond. When you shake the iPhone, you sprinkle food into the water. And if you hold your finger still on the screen, the koi will seem to nibble at it as the phone vibrates. For now, there's a "holiday mode" in which some of the koi have reindeer antlers and red noses and holly replaces the lily pads. And when you shake the phone, you hear bells jingling and you feed the fish gingerbread men and candy canes instead of flakes.
We timed our arrival at the Ridgewood train station well enough that I didn't have to run for the train or hang out for a long time. Woo hoo! It had been a nice—though sadly showless :-)—Thanksgiving spent mostly in New Jersey.
And now, to finish this post, a trio of photos:
The hooligans: Mike has his arm around Matt.
David and Tracey
And the turkey carving station. Eat your heart out, Dad.** Hah!
*That's in the Quotes and Scenes Summary section of the page, in the part where Edna and Principal Skinner are on the stage with Ned Flanders, both of them trying to sway the public regarding the teachers' contract demands.
**ARROHK, Dad is particularly fond of Preakness's turkey.
