be optimistic!

OK, I'm a little nervous about Thanksgiving. We're getting food stores at some point, hopefully before the holiday. This is what I'm thinking of:

My company is run by southerners. Don't get me wrong, the idea of deep-frying a whole turkey is apparently genius, so they've certainly gotten something right. But southern cooking to me is simply this: rooting around in the trash after northern cooking is done, then pan-frying the contents of the compost heap.

But yeah, I''m a little afraid that they'll offer us a real 'treat'. A 'turducken'

Bloody savages.

Look, I like turkey. Duck, too. Chicken? Fine. Put 'em together and what do you get? Poultry-flavored chunky jello. Smells like heaven, tastes like feet. I'm afraid that one year they'll forego the turkey.

I know that not all southern cooking is bad. But I know bad cooking, too. I'm of Irish descent, and 90% of what my ancestors ate is stuff that should only be eaten on a dare. Black Pudding. Blood pudding, Donkey's Gudge, whatever. I like it. I even like Haggis. But Turducken makes me want to cry.

Being honest, I could give turkey a pass. Give me a nice spiral-cut ham anytime for Thanksgiving. I come from the place where the friggin' holiday started. 400 years of friggin' turkey is enough. Let's mix it up a little. Slaughter a swine for ourselves. But no turducken, please.

Anyhow, parting shot: I always wonder at the Pre-thanksgiving stores delivery. The chandler always puts 4- 25 lb birds in one box that breaks open as we lift it up the stairs. Think: it's raining frozen blocks of meat. Anyhow, the birds then skitter across the deck like a curling match is going on, and we've got to go recover them and bucket-brigade our now-tenderized turkeys back to the stores hatch and down into storage.

If you're the praying type, pray that we go to anchor for Thanksgiving. It's actually a nice holiday on board, when it's not inturrupted by cargo ops.