Raincharm’s Weblog

Happy Thanksgiving. We spent our day making dinner, eating dinner and now digesting dinner, and giving thanks for being together.

The making of dinner in a campus apartment kitchen, populated by 3 boys young men required

bringing a roasting pan, meat thermometer, pie plate (and pie fixings), casserole dish (who doesn’t have at least one casserole dish?), baster from Seattle,

two trips to Albertsons this morning for

• Trip 1 = tin foil, saran wrap, plastic storage containers, wine, sparkling cider, blue cheese and paper towels and Milk.
• Trip 2 = bread cubes for stuffing (not Stove Top) and Cool Whip. (I did not bring the mixer and didn”t feel like having a whipping party.)

We had a basic Thanksgiving dinner after figuring out how to use smaller pots and pans to make just about everything. (We did have a full size roasting pan). Turkey, stuffing in and out, broccoli (a bit overdone), smashed potatoes (after a few moments of – “What no smasher” panic) and rolls, with pumpkin pie for dessert. I am stuffed. Since most of the pots and pans and what not were not Rey’s this lesson screams potential Christmas ideas.

One very nice bit about cooking in the small kitchen is that you are really right in the “living” room with everyone else. Everyone else being Rey and Carl. Rey’s roommate Nick joined us for dinner and dessert. Ashlan joined us following dinner via the telephone – without a phone card – hang the expense, it’s Thanksgiving.

Smashing Potatoes

This feels like a tired blog – meandering and written with a loose waistband, so I will let it go at that. I did take some pictures of the kitchen, but Rey’s computer and my camera equipment (that is with me) don’t match. Maybe when I connect up my machine later.

So pretend it is still Wednesday.

Got off a little later than planned, around 8:30. Not too bad, and later because Carl let me sleep – OK by me.
Word for the first 1/2, the Washington 1/2 of the trip was FOG.
Carl drove the fog 1/2, and the scenery was, well, limited.
Although eastern Washington is somewhat repetitive, the scablands always make me think of the Great Lake Missoula Floods, and we are heading to Missoula, so it all ties together. I am thinking of looking at the googlemaps version of the area to see if you can see the ripples. It is supposed to be like the bottom of a lake.

Second half was cold, but a bit of sun here and there, mostly there, like, “there’s the sunshine, high on that mountain,” but generally not down on the road. But there were only a few icy spots, and the traffic was steady, but not really heavy. And this really is the better scenery half, all windy road and trees, fields and one deer.

Got in to Missoula around 4:30. Checked in and took Rey out to dinner at an Italian restaurant. Hung out with him and cooked a pumpkin pie. Some friends showed up. One is a chef and helped me (took over) thawing the turkey. Despite my detailed directions to take the inner bits out of the turkey, they were still there. Hared did the water bath thing, helped me make sure the pie was done, and nicely wrapped the turkey for the fridge until the morning.

[Note from the future – today. Wish I had not been so travel weary and had tapped all the chef knowledge in the kitchen. I noted that I had forgotten to bring any recipes or cooking directions, and there were all the answers standing right there. But I did not come to that realization until this morning.]

Back to the past. Eventually Carl & I made an exit back to the Creekside Inn. Creekside is a comfortable, sort of ratty little motel. But it is cheaper and well situated for our needs. While checking in we found out it has been acquired by Motel 6. Now we spent many years in Motel 6’s and I am not sure whether this is a move up or down, except I really liked the local quality, maybe that will stay the same. We got into our room and heard “beep”. “What was that,” Carl inquired? I thought my squeeky shoes had made the noise, but it was carpeted. A minute later we determined that the smoke alarm was beeping like a low battery. Called the front desk and the nice young man in training said he would be right up. And he was, but only to determine the type battery needed, 9 Volt. So off he goes. Beep, beep, beep, ….. Half hour goes by and no return visit. We think – they had to go buy a battery. Finally call again. The nice young man in training had needed to check in some other guests after checking our battery, and had just forgotten what else he was doing – I think this is the training part. The trainer shows up with the battery and in 30 seconds we are good to go – to bed finally.