Giving Thanks for More Food Than I Have Ever Seen

Since we couldn't afford to come home this year, we decided to make the best of it and have an Orphan's Thanksgiving w/ other stranded folks. "Y'know, something casual," said we, "Not too much food, just good talk, good wine, the good life." "Sounds great," says everyone else.

So we get together at Garren's place because he has a basement full of wine. One of the good things about meeting folks from working at a wine bar is that you get surrounded by Foodies and Winos, all of whom were in attendance.

So the girls congregated in the front room, probably sewing barefoot and pregnant or something, while the guys got sweaty over all the food in the kitchen.

Because we are weird, we got excited by how much stuff we could keep stuffing into the oven already full of stuff (keep in mind this is after we took out the turkey, another stuffed dish full of stuffing, and I think something else, too):



I also got excited about eating seafood again. No offense to Gulf inhabitants, but the dungeness crab out here is unbeatable:



So I'm beginning to think that all that talk about a moderate amount of food went right out the window, but we keep cooking away. Turns out that for 7 people, we filled up three tables full of food. Juli and I brought the crab, some collards, a quinoa salad, and a broccoli slaw:







Absolutely delicious.

So then we sat on the couch and moaned and rubbed our engorged stomachs distended down to our knees and reminisced about that one time when we swore we wouldn't bring too much food. We tried some port as a digestiv, to limited success.

Eventually we helped each other off of the sofa like husbands to pregnant wives and decided to take a stroll down to here:



For those of you who have visited us, I'm pretty sure we've taken everyone down to Gasworks Park. Great cityline views and interesting architecture (see above). It makes Juli and I happy every time:



The sun was setting, and everything was golden and beautiful, and we ended up making an inadvertent advertising campaign for Washington wines.

Happy people, foreground and background:



All these pics need are taglines like, "Experience the Eternal Beauty of the Pacific Northwest" or "Bon Vivant Luxury at a Pioneer Price!!!", or something (this is why they don't let me into advertising):











We ambled back in the dark, happy as proverbial clams. Then Theresa tried out her kickboxing skills on Keith. It was time, I guess:



Eventually, as at all Thanksgiving celebrations, so full of timeless tradition and reverence, the flan and persimmons came out:



We spent more time than I want to admit balancing persimmons on our heads:



Once that happens, Juli and I are smart enough to know that it's time to mosey on home. Good times.

Seattle Samhain Pt. II

Trying to get some of our pics up onto this dern blog o' ours:

This year for Halloween, we did what probably everyone else did, too--dressed up F.A.N.C.Y. and went to go see a local burlesque/musical/martial arts/circus group in an abandoned chocolate factory.

Here are the guilty parties starting out their night proper (please note Garren is not F.A.N.C.Y.--he is a 6 ft. carrot-top Catholic school girl [naturally]):



I am looking admirably at my stunning mate:



We are looking admirably at Garren's stunning asset:



Things started out somewhat under control. We're die-hard fans of Circus Contraption now. We first saw them almost a year ago and were hooked immediately--dirty jukejoint Tin Pan Alley band replete w/ ukulele and horn section backing up acrobats, jugglers, magicians, sword swallowers, you name it. Plus, they have a pole dancer. Automatic good times, in our book. Here we are, revving up but still w/ our senses about us:



Didn't take too long for this to happen:



And then this happened:



And then, dear Lord, this happened:



Here is the ringleader of said Circus Contraption, Armitage Shanks, looking fetching (and bloody):



There was also an INCREDIBLE opening act that did synchronized martial arts choreography over a soundtrack of classic Hong Kong karate sound effects. I keep trying to upload a video of it, but Blogger and/or Google is being grumpy, so please complain to them.

This is the aforementioned pole dancer sans pole for the night, looking decidedly more pale and undead. She climbs the rope:



And does a bunch of craziness like this (keep in mind this is 20-30 ft. up in the rafters of an old creaky warehouse):



So yeah, we had an awesome time.



BONUS OCTUBRE FUN TIME PICTURE!!!!!: Two VERY serious musicians contemplating their art, their lives, and the Universe itself: